VOICES FROM INSIDE THE SYSTEM
‘We All Deserve Equal Access to Health Care’
This rheumatologist is working against a health care system plagued by implicit bias and inherent discrimination
Voices From Inside the System is a new GEN series where we interview people who have had firsthand experience in industries with especially fraught histories of systemic racism and inequity. We asked our subjects to think deeply about the role they played and the work they did. We asked them why they stayed or why they left, how they might be complicit, and if they thought they — or anyone — could fundamentally change the system.
Magdalena Cadet, 44, is a rheumatologist based in New York committed to educating Black women about their health. Racial disparities in health care often lead to fatal outcomes for Black women. Pregnancy-related deaths are four to five times higher for Black women than white. And studies show as much as 60% of those deaths could have been prevented. Cadet spoke with journalist Melinda Fakuade about how the health care system fails its patients of color.
I was close to 30 years old by the time I completed my medical training. My dad’s a doctor, and I have a few family members who are doctors. I just remember looking at him when I was…
