Racism in medicine | DW Documentary

More than a quarter of the population of Germany has a migrant background. Many report that they have received substandard care from doctors and hospitals. Is the healthcare system afflicted by racism? This documentary hears from people who’ve been turned away or received inadequate care in a medical emergency; from midwives who report on racism in the delivery room; from students who criticize teaching according to white norms; as well as from doctors who reflect on the problem. The film shows just how dangerous conscious or unconscious racism in the healthcare sector can be. Its findings are based on the results of the first representative study on the issue in Germany, published in November 2023 by the German Centre for Integration and Migration Research. The fact is: Even today, the term ‘Morbus Mediterraneus’ still circulates in the healthcare sector, which is intended to describe “exaggerated suffering in southerners“. Standard medical equipment doesn’t always function reliably when used on dark-skinned patients. And many doctors have never learned that some diseases can be diagnosed differently depending on whether the person is Black or White. The medical norm, even in textbooks, is still the white, western European patient. This can result in misdiagnosis and the serious worsening of symptoms. Take the case of Remziye T. from Lower Saxony: Her infected heart valve went undiscovered for a long time because doctors didn’t take her pain seriously enough. When the problem was eventually correctly diagnosed, it was too late for medical treatment. Now Remziye T. has to live with a mechanical heart valve: the operation has left her unable to walk properly and she is no longer able to work. Dr. Bismarck Ofori allowed the camera team to film in his Hanover surgery. Many of the patients who attend the Black doctor’s practice have a migrant background. They tell him they’ve not been taken seriously in other surgeries; some of them were even brusquely turned away. In Ofori’s treatment room, it’s evident that careful diagnosis and overcoming language barriers in the process costs time and money. Not that language is the only obstacle to making a correct diagnosis. The pulse oximeter, for example, a device used to measure the blood’s oxygen content, can be less accurate when used on patients with darker skin. But this is not systematically taught at medical school. The healthcare system is only just beginning to unpack the issue of racism and its impact. But many doctors, medical students, midwives and a medical historian have spoken out - addressing a problem that, in the worst-case scenario, can have fatal consequences.