Given the interest in my first blog, Race and America: How did we get here and what can we do about it?, I’ve decided to write a series of blogs summarizing some of the history I was never taught in school that informs the entrenched health disparities that patient navigators are charged with addressing.
A 2016 study of medical students found an association between students who endorsed beliefs that Black people were less prone to pain, have smaller brains, and have thicker skins with inequitable pain management compared to White patients.1 The idea that Black and White have biologically different experiences of pain, brain size, and skin thickness, is the legacy of a racist clinical research enterprise in America.
