Advancing health equity in medicine requires a clear-eyed understanding of history, a rejection of race-based clinical assumptions and a commitment to transform research into practice, said Dr. Joseph L. Wright, senior vice president and chief health equity officer of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), in his keynote address for Weill Cornell Medicine’s eighth annual Diversity Week.
Dr. Wright delivered the Elizabeth A. Wilson-Anstey, EdD Lecture, “Advancing Health Equity: Why History Matters,” April 20 in Uris Auditorium as part of the institution’s commitment to greater equity, diversity and inclusion in academic medicine and health care.
Using a “roots and leaves” approach, he threaded his own family history—from enslavement to modern-day encounters with discrimination—throughout his address to emphasize how social and historical forces, especially racism, can shape health outcomes across generations. Health disparities cannot be understood without also acknowledging structural factors such as redlining, he said.
