Skin turning blue is racist and needs decolonising.

I am really sorry you struggle to believe that when people working in those sectirs have told you that similar things are happening to girls in terms of diagnosis, and treatment, as I have seen that first hand in my professional practice I have no difficulty in believing it, perhaps it's to do with experience in those fields.

Sectors even

All that these doctors are trying to do is broaden their approach to be inclusive in diagnostics when dealing with people of all colours. It’s a change in language.
The medical profession and society at large have coped very well with changes in acceptable language over the decades and I doubt this will be any different.
There is no mention of banning the use of the word “blue”, simply that the spectrum for diagnosis will be broadened so instead of blue tinge there will be a wider diagnostic tool used based on skin colour. If there is actual genuine concern that someone who has studied extensively to become a doctor can not navigate a diagnostic matrix which matches ethnicity with symptoms as is being suggested by OP then I think the bigger concern is for the profession as a whole.

Could a doctor put lives at risk because they cannot use the term ' blue tinge' to denote possible heart failure
Wouldn't it be better to diagnose "heart failure" in the first place regardless of skin colour, or are you in fact acknowledging the whole point of this initiative that doctors are looking at skin colour and may miss symptoms in patients who are not white? Because that seems the logical outcome.

Many countries now train doctors etc In many the population is not pale skinned - have the doctors not noticed that some symptoms of conditions show differently on darker skins or are their findings not taken into account by pale skinned male doctors?
Migration has shown that there are differences in races and these go across many sectors - dress/ food preferences/ clothing etc as well as medical ones. We should research where an alternative medical treatment may need to be given and we should embrace other differences to enhance the lives of everyone.

Discrimination is the insidious cancer in this country---everywhere you look.
The poorer sector of society aren't given a cat in Hell's chance of succeeding in anything and this refers to both black and white in employment and education and it's about time that both rich and poor were treated equally with equal opportunities

The division in society is horrendous as well as sickening. It's the sheer lack of incentive that drives many to crime. It doesn't seem to penetrate the thick heads of those in government that instead of encouraging the poorer members of society, they appear to be giving up on them and casting them aside.

What chance immigrants when we can't even help our own ?
Times are changing, there's no place for haves and have-nots any more. Well there shouldn't be !! Equality Act 2010.

I agree EV - this morning I read that some franchisees of MacDonalds are taking joint action against the company for discriminating against them with businesses in poor areas with less footfall etc and in effect setting them up to fail. These people are not white males etc. I hope they win compensation.

Who wants to be a smurf anyway.?

The problem here seems, to me, to be in the terminology. We have come to equate the words racism and sexism with bigotry. In fact those words refer to many differences in treatment between races or sexes.
In the case of medical training, as is being discussed here, institutional racism and sexism is found in the fact that much research, training and treatment is based on white men. This is, or should be, changing rapidly now that we have embraced our multi-racial, multi-cultural society so that we have equality across the board.
I don't, for one minute, think that the terms bluish tinge or yellowing skin will be abolished, but rather they will still be applied in relation to white skin. Symptoms that apply to other skin colours will be added to the training manuals.
Institutional racism applies to institutions where unconscious inequality exists.

Welshwife

Many countries now train doctors etc In many the population is not pale skinned - have the doctors not noticed that some symptoms of conditions show differently on darker skins or are their findings not taken into account by pale skinned male doctors?
Migration has shown that there are differences in races and these go across many sectors - dress/ food preferences/ clothing etc as well as medical ones. We should research where an alternative medical treatment may need to be given and we should embrace other differences to enhance the lives of everyone.

I was going to observe that 'the West' is not the only place that trains medical professionals nowadays. Surely where the population is largely non white, there must be a recognized way of describing symptoms of heart failure (or whatever)?

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Summerlove

Lolo81

I’m sorry if I’m missing something here and would happily have a think about any further explanation, but I genuinely don’t see the issue with labelling this as institutional racism.
That’s not to say that any of the people teaching, learning or performing medicine are racist in any way, but simply pointing out that the basis of curriculum is based off of studies/practices that are predominantly directed at a white populations. That in and of itself is racism.
Most facets of academia in the western world do have an ethnocentric perspective. If these teachers and the students are looking to evolve the curriculum to make it more representative of the population and to ensure people of all ethic backgrounds are treated with the same level of knowledge and skill then surely that’s a good thing?

Is it purely the label of racism that people are finding offensive here?

To me, it is institutional racism.

People hear “racism” and get so up in arms and defensive, that they can’t seem to see it for what it is.

I absolutely agree with both of you.

The entire system is built on a racist past. That is why changes are needed and are happening. Teaching medical students how to treat different races is important.

I can report that I am not in the medical field. But I have to be CPR certified every 2 years for my volunteer position. I can tell you that the training I got from the Red Cross does in fact tell you that turning blue = lack of oxygen.

I had not though about that until this thread. What would I look for if a black person needed help? It does need to be updated.

My grandson is also at medical school training to be a doctor. He is in a racial minority group being white Australian because the vast majority of other students are Asians, mostly Indian and Chinese. I would have thought the same would apply to the British medical schools. I'm tempted to say Asian people have more brains but that would be a bit of racism, too.

Lucky for you, Sparklingsilver, that you don't have brown skin. Your experience of the UK would be very different if you did.

Surely any person (even without it being specified in training), would have the common sense to say to themselves "Well, heart disease may turn the skin blue, but this person's skin is too dark for me to see any tinge of blue, so I am not going to diagnose them as having a perfectly healthy heart just on THAT lack of evidence. what else can I try?"

The "skin turning blue" symptom is not wrong and wicked, as is implied in the accusation of racism. It has proved very useful in diagnosing heart problems to thousands of the people using the medical services in places where it has been proved a very common symptom of heart disease - but more symptoms should be ADDED to include the growing proportion of non-white people in those populations.

Many many details have been ADDED to the physicians' armoury of clues to illness. We do ADD varied and sophisticated tests and signs over time without accusing the medical profession of discriminatory neglect of patients by not using them earlier.

Asking "Why are so many seeming to fight to keep everything as is so that the main beneficiaries are white men?" is misssing the point of most of the replies. What people are saying is NOT that everything is hunky-dory and should be kept the same but that making it a reason to blame the medical profession and make them feel guilty is not a necessary way of going about ADDING more detail if it is needed.

It is simply that medical schools have failed to keep up with changes in society over the last 50 yeaars and the anti-racism bandwagon is any easy way to catch up, without asdmitting it.

In my childhood almost everyone in this country was of white European origins, The majority of doctors were unlikely to ever treat anyne who wasn't. Times have changed and the medical schools have only just noticed it and are now making changes they should have made in the 1960s.

When do you think they will notice that half the population is not male and and include teaching medical students about how illnesses present differently in women to the way they do in men?

Another example of institutional racism in medicine, maternal death rate is MUCH higher among women of ethnic minorities in the UK.

I knew that GagaJo but I’d really like to know why. There must be a reason. Do ethnic minorities access prenatal care for example? It must be difficult to do that if you don’t speak English. I’m not saying that’s the reason, I’m just wondering why maternal death is higher in the ethnic minorities.

At veterinary school we were taught about cyanosis (blue tinge) & our patients were never white men. We looked at gums and conjunctiva (our patients being quite hairy), it's a fairly universal sign- dogs & cats turn blue when short on oxygen and very scarey it is too. I can see that in medical school it might be neccessary to emphasize that you need take into account skin colour when evaluating this, but it isn't a symptom useful exclusively in white men.

maddyone

I knew that GagaJo but I’d really like to know why. There must be a reason. Do ethnic minorities access prenatal care for example? It must be difficult to do that if you don’t speak English. I’m not saying that’s the reason, I’m just wondering why maternal death is higher in the ethnic minorities.

Plenty of Black British women around. Or British women of colour who aren't Afro Caribbean. Lets not beat around the bush. It's neglect caused by racism.

I was very glad my DD had DGS overseas. Spanish NHS. 121 care from a dedicated midwife from start of labour to birth. Phenomenal. I wouldn't have trusted the level of care she'd get in the UK.

from what i've heard of black women's experience of nhs maternity services, there is a common theme of being ignored when reporting pain or any worrying symptom.
they are often spoken down to, as if they are exaggerating, so intervention may be delayed leading to avoidable harm.
mind you, maternity services for anyone, of any colour, have a poor reputation in this country.
but the statistics speak for themselves, more black women suffer more poor outcomes.

The majority of women from other ethnic backgrounds have English as their mother tongue or learn it quite quickly once they arrive hear. I do not think there is a language barrier, or at least not a mojor one except in certain specific communities.

I suspect it may be that many of them are still disproportionately among the poorest in the community and that group, regardless of ethnicity, are less likely to access maternity services.

tammybrown

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thread last posted september 2020 until Tammybrown deleted post!

Wonder why tammybrown posted on this year old thread something that was then deleted?

This BBC article outlines some of the causes behind the mortality figures for black women. I’m proud to call one of the women quoted, Mars Lord, a friend of many years.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-47115305

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