How Health Inequity Impacts Black Communities with Dr. Uché Blackstock
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Description
In early 2020, the world witnessed the rapid spread of a pandemic that brought many industries to a standstill, but the healthcare system remained overwhelmed, exposing deep-seated issues within it. One of the stark realities brought to the forefront was the persistent health inequities that disproportionately affect Black people. As the healthcare system buckled under the weight of COVID-19, it also unveiled the long-standing racial disparities in medical care.
Amid this crisis, Dr. Uché Blackstock emerged as a leading voice, one of the first to raise awareness about racial health inequities during the pandemic. Through her consulting firm, Advancing Health Equity, and her bestselling memoir Legacy: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine, Dr. Blackstock confronts systemic racism in healthcare and advocates for meaningful change.
In this episode of Branding Room Only, Paula Edgar and Dr. Blackstock dive into her inspiring journey from Brooklyn to Harvard and beyond, highlighting her battle against racism in healthcare and her passion for public health and equity. Dr. Blackstock shares personal stories, detailing how her upbringing in Brooklyn and her mother’s legacy shaped her path, as well as her approach to healthcare equity. They also discuss the profound impact of racial bias in healthcare on Black communities and the need to support Black-led community-based organizations to advance health equity.
Chapters
1:46 - Dr. Blackstock’s personal brand and three-word description, favorite quote, and the hype song she plays right before she gives a speech
6:19 - How Dr. Blackstock’s personal brand and educational journey was shaped by her surroundings and her mother
15:17 - Dr. Blackstock’s career journey and the effect of expectation on Black women’s health
22:01 - What inspired her to create her consulting firm and sound the alarm about racial health inequity
27:57 - The most challenging barriers Dr. Blackstock has encountered as she tries implementing change in the healthcare system
32:12 - The catalyst that inspired Dr. Blackstock to write Legacy and why people (especially students) should read it
40:00 - What you can do to support racial health equity and culturally responsive healthcare in marginalized communities
42:26 - The dearest role in Dr. Blackstock’s life, the uncompromisable aspect of her brand, and the ability she was born with that helps her with public speaking
Connect With Dr. Uché Blackstock
Dr. Uché Blackstock is the founder and CEO of Advancing Health Equity. She partners with healthcare organizations to dismantle racism in healthcare and close the racial health equity gap. She received her undergraduate and medical degrees from Harvard University, is a former associate professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine, and is the former faculty director for recruitment, retention, and inclusion in the Office of Diversity Affairs at NYU School of Medicine.
As a physician, author, and sought-after speaker, Dr. Blackstock has regularly appeared on MSNBC and NBC News and been profiled in the New York Times and on PBS NewsHour. Her book Legacy: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine, is a New York Times bestseller and serves as both a memoir and a call to action for people to support Black communities. Currently, she lives in her hometown of Brooklyn, NY with her two kids.
Advancing Health Equity | LinkedIn | Instagram
Mentioned In How Health Inequity Impacts Black Communities with Dr. Uché Blackstock
Legacy: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine by Uché Blackstock, MD
Weathering: The Extraordinary Stress of Ordinary Life in an Unjust Society by Arline T. Geronimus
Harlem Chi Community Acupuncture
My Brother’s Keeper (MBK) | My Sister’s Keeper (MSK)
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Transcript
Paula Edgar: Welcome to The Branding Room Only Podcast where we share career stories, strategies, and lessons learned on how industry leaders and influencers have built their personal brands. Now, let's get started with the show.
Y'all, on today's podcast, we have the remarkable Dr. Uché Blackstock, who for the longest time has been my friend in my head. Our discussion delves into so many things, but really what resonates for me is her integrity, the compassion she has, and the fact that she has this purpose-driven life.
We talk a lot about her book and her commitment to public health and equity. I can't wait for you to hear this fantastic conversation about how her experience from Brooklyn, like me and in the medical field have led her to the work that she does now. Listen up.
Hi, everybody. It's Paula Edgar, your host, a Branding Room Only, looking so forward to today's conversation with a phenom, Dr. Uché Blackstock. She is the author of The New York Times bestseller Legacy: A Black Physician Reckons with Racism in Medicine.
In addition to being an author, Dr. Uché Blackstock is a physician and thought leader on bias and racism in healthcare. She is also the founder and CEO of Advancing Health Equity, and she appears regularly on MSNBC and NBC News. Dr. Blackstock received both her undergraduate and medical degrees from Harvard University, making her and her twin sister only the first Black mother-daughter legacies from Harvard Medical School. All the snaps to that, Dr. Blackstock, welcome to the Branding Room.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Thank you so much, Paula, for having me.
Paula Edgar: Awesome. I'm excited for this conversation. I start off all of my podcast with asking folks this question: what does a personal brand mean to you? How would you define it?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: It's interesting. When I saw that you had that question, I was like, “Oh, my God, this is so funny that she asked me this.” Because recently at a talk, after I gave a talk, a journalist that I've been interviewed by multiple times of the last few years said to me, “Well, what are you going to do now? Because you are a brand.”
What I recognize is what she meant is that all of the purpose-driven work I do is actually represented in me. It's who I am. I am authentic. I have integrity. I'm passionate. All of it aligns together.
I feel like when they meet me, they meet all of the values that I hold very dear to myself and that are important to me. That is my brand. That's what people know of me. That's why they respect me. That's why if I am sharing information, they listen a little bit more because of those reasons.
Paula Edgar: Agreed. It's your street cred. That resonates for me because I followed you, as I mentioned to you before we started, on social. There are some core pieces that I know. It makes people feel as if they have an understanding of you prior to even engaging with you.
I feel even more so because I would say when I listen to an audiobook that you read to me a story out loud. It's that and plus. Thinking about that, how would you describe yourself in three words or short phrases?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Okay, three words. I would say, I already said this already, but I am compassionate. I am purpose-driven. And this isn’t cheating, right? I have integrity.
Paula Edgar: It's not cheating. It's all right. If it resonates for you, it resonates for us. I know it's an unfair question, but I ask it to everyone anyway. My next question is this: do you have a favorite quote or mantra that you use?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. I don't know who to attribute it to, but it goes like if your dreams do not scare you, then you're not dreaming big enough. That's something that I didn't appreciate until more recently in my life.
But once I started thinking bigger, giving myself permission to do so and recognizing a lot of times when I was nervous about something, it wasn’t that I was nervous, it was just that I was heavily invested in it and I knew that I was going to do an amazing job.
Paula Edgar: It's like when you think about those dreams, it’s intention setting too. When you have that intention, it's outside now so it's a little bit scary, but I get it. You all can trust in yourself. I have a magnet on my refrigerator that says, “Believe in you.”
It's exactly that. If you can dream it then it's something that's inside of you other than me going to space trying to do that. I think that society wise there's a lot of “you can'ts” and when we start to own our “can’t” everything shifts.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Right, right. Agreed
Paula Edgar: Tell me about this, do you have a hype song? Here's how I describe it. If they're going to get full Dr. Uché Blackstock coming into the room, what song is playing in your head? Or, if you're having a bad day, what song do you play to get yourself up? It could be the same song or different ones.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: I grew up in Brooklyn in the ‘80s. I love ‘90s hip-hop. I love the song, Ante Up by M.O.P. That's the song that I play on my phone and my earphones right before I give a talk. Because I'm like, “Uché, you got this.” Makes me feel I can do anything.
Paula Edgar: Yeah, that's a good song. I'm putting together a playlist of everybody's answers. That's a good one to be on there. Of course, my Brooklyn girl resonates with that because I'm ready to dance. I love it. I love that.
All right. Well, we started talking about Brooklyn. Tell me, my question is, where did you grow up? How did that shape your personal brand?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: I grew up in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. I actually spent all 18 years of my life on the same block in Crown Heights. Born to a father who was from Jamaica. My mother was from Brooklyn.
They were the first in their families to finish college and then go to graduate school. I think that they wanted to provide my sister and me with the lives that they didn't have.
We got to see the real real on the streets of Brooklyn in the ‘80s and ‘90s. I saw a lot. I saw people get shot. I saw a lot of drug dealing happening. But I also saw a lot of joy.
I saw my parents take us to the Brooklyn Museum and Prospect Park, just everything was a learning experience. I have very fond memories of growing up in Brooklyn. My mother was a physician. I feel like I was surrounded by Black women physicians growing up. I knew that that was something that I could be. These were women who were also very committed to working in service to our communities. It was the best role model I could have had.
Paula Edgar: Oh, I love that. Especially, as I shared before, so your mom worked and you worked at Kings County, which is where I was born. I lived in East New York. I still live in Brooklyn, but I live in Clinton Hill now a little closer to the side.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: We're neighbors.
Paula Edgar: Right. I always think about all of these things. I knew my precinct when I was growing up. Most people, when you're living in the suburbs, you don't know your precinct number. But it didn't feel like a hard time. It didn't feel terrible. It felt like this was just the Brooklyn that we're from.
I remember my mother used to take me to the library, to Grand Army Plaza. I thought that was Manhattan. Because I was like, “Oh, this is big buildings. It must be Manhattan.”
I didn't realize until I was a lot older that I was still in Brooklyn because we came all the way across just to go to the library. A lot of fond memories of that space. I understand as also my mother was Jamaican and being raised by folks of West Indian connections also shapes what is expected of you, don't you think, too?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, absolutely. A lot is expected.
Paula Edgar: Speaking of that expectation, tell me about your education journey then.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, so for the first part of my life, I went to a small Caribbean school, a mostly Caribbean American school in Crown Heights called St. Mark's Day School. That was from pre-K to sixth grade. It was an Episcopalian school.
I thought it was home. Then after that, my parents wanted just to switch us out because they wanted us in a more academically rigorous environment. That's when we went to Packer Collegiate which is an independent school in Brooklyn Heights, totally just different environment.
We're the one of the only Black kids in our class the only ones from our ZIP code, 11216. I thought my life was good, and my life was good, but these other kids had lives that I could not have even imagined living in the biggest homes, went on luxury vacations.
I think that was the first time in a very long time that I didn't feel at home. I felt out of place. Then after that, I went to Stuyvesant for high school. Again, that's a math and science high school, but only 5% of students are Black. Going from being in a predominantly Black environment in elementary school to mostly predominantly white or predominantly white in Asian in high school and being one of the only.
Paula Edgar: Yes. Then Harvard, darling.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, and then I just wanted to continue to torture myself. Then Harvard undergrad, which is actually pretty cool because I feel like I got to meet other Black students there who also were really interested in a lot of the same things I was interested in and made a lot of really wonderful friendships.
But then, of course, during my sophomore year, my mother was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia. I feel like I didn't have the same college experience as my friends who were just having a good time because my sister and I had to travel back and forth between Boston and New York City to see her. She was in and out of the hospital. Then we were also both pre-med so we had to take care of our work. It was a lot.
Paula Edgar: Yeah. When I got to that part of the story, I thought to myself, “How proud your mom must have been to have literally both of you as a legacy and going on the same path at the same institution.”
The challenge is my daughter is a freshman. She just finished her freshman year at Spellman. Just thinking about college and the experience of having that first and second year where you're just like, “Woohoo, everything's good. We really have to focus.”
But when you're pre-med, I guess you really have to focus no matter what. I can imagine how challenging it must have been having to navigate your mother's illness at that time.
My listeners know that my mother was killed on September 11th. When I thought about the things that aligned with us and having all of these similarities and then experiencing loss, losing your mother shifts to you, I think, in a way that people can't understand because almost everything I do, I'm thinking, it's like I'm showing up because my mother would have wanted me to do.
I could feel that in what you were saying and the work that you continue to do and still do. I really felt this book was in honor of her. That you're telling the student work that you have done. Before I jump into that, talk a little bit about the fact that you and your sister followed in your mom's footsteps by going to Harvard. What was that like? What was she excited about? Tell me what it was like when you both decided to do that.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, well, the thing is, because she passed away after our sophomore year, she knew that we were pre-med, that we were going to go to medical school, but she didn't know we were going to go to Harvard med.
I remember just being there, meeting actually some of the deans that knew her, that were the old school deans that knew her. Still also, because they knew her, looked out for my sister and me, that was a nice feeling. It was like she was around even though she wasn't physically around.
Then yeah, Harvard med school was wonderful. It was a very positive experience. Of course, I was always wondering, “I would love to talk to her and compare experiences,” or “I would love to ask her advice about this clinical rotation I'm doing or this class that I'm taking.”
I agree with you, when you lose your mother, the person who brought you into the world, I always say the rug was pulled from underneath me, and I've been trying to find my footing ever since.
I know it's going to be a lifelong journey because I was 19 years old. Even though at the time, I didn't feel like a kid, I still, when I was looking I was like, “Oh, my goodness, you were a baby. You were a baby.”
I'm so proud that we could be at Harvard Med, continuing our mother's legacy. I think even more so, what I had thought about before was that my mother getting to Harvard Med in the 1970s, she literally had to climb over so many barriers.
Just grew up in Brooklyn on public assistance. Her mother was a single mother. She had five other siblings. She just had to go through so much to get there. I think there's a piece of me that was always like, “I wish that she could have had an opportunity to have a little bit of an easier life.” Even later on in life, she deserved that.
Paula Edgar: Yeah. I hear that because when you think about how hard it is now, it's not easy to do the path, then with everything that's happened societally and the fact that people were not as “open” to diversity being a thing.
I know whether there are some rollbacks and pushbacks that are happening now, that must have been pretty challenging just generally. I just feel like as a mother, and I know we both are parents, I just was beaming the whole time thinking about how she must have been and still is proud. All right, talk to me about after Harvard Medical School, your career journey.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, so after Harvard Med, I got to come back to Brooklyn because I also wanted to be closer to my mom's spirit. There are so many memories I have of her, of us just growing up here, beautiful memories.
After med school, I need that, especially during residency, I trained in emergency medicine, in the county like you mentioned. I knew residency was going to be hard. I was like, “Let me just come back home to an environment that I am not only more familiar with but where I feel at home, essentially.”
I really enjoyed being able to train at Kings County, even though it was very challenging because literally, I would be on shift in my attending physician and my senior residents were Black.
Literally, to care for the patients who seek care at Kings County is such a privilege to care for them. They're so gracious. There I had a great time. But then I ended up burning out by the end of residency. This is what happens. You have a system that is broken, a broken healthcare system in public hospitals that are under-resourced.
It started really getting to me to the point where I felt like I was becoming a different person. I had to just make some decisions. I left. I did a fellowship in an emergency ultrasound at St. Louis Roosevelt. Then I went on faculty for 10 years at NYU School of Medicine.
That's where I really had a lot of revelations about how we are treated, even within organizations and institutions, despite having all the accomplishments we have. It was really an eye-opening moment for me.
Paula Edgar: Wow. Yeah. As for the work that I do, I consult with organizations, professional development, and also around diversity, equity, and inclusion across industries, but I'm a lawyer, so a lot of lawyers.
I see institutions over and over again having these well-credentialed Black women and Black men who continue to be subject to the conscious and unconscious bias that happens because of all of the things, but that it just keeps getting perpetuated.
Then you see people doing exactly what you talked about, burning out. I find that in this country, particularly just given the fact that we were founded on chattel slavery, there is this expectation that Black women are going to continue to take and take and take it take and take until they burn out.
Then it's like, “Okay, now you've got two days to rest, get back up, and keep going.” Hearing yourself and hearing that it was too much and then saying, “I need to do something different” I think it’s profound and it's a lesson that people need to hear. Because we don't have to kill ourselves in order to do good work.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: That's why even the end of Legacy is a call to action chapter. I had to make sure I had a special section for Black women like we are not here to save the world. Yes, we're here to do meaningful work, the work that gives us purpose and that we enjoy. But we're not going to burn out for other people, for institutions, even our children.
Paula Edgar: Yup. Double click on that one. It's so true because I think about you just in my cohort of people who I know folks who have gotten autoimmune diseases and stress-related things, all of these things that they were fine otherwise until having be in these environments that really your body respond to these things.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Well, that's why in the book, I talk a little bit about the weathering that this phenomenon described by the public health researcher, Arline Geronimus, where she talks about how just dealing with everyday racism, we internalize that chronic stress leads to us developing chronic diseases, and premature aging.
I think it's so interesting because even though from the outside, it's Black people, Black women, we are so beautiful, we always look younger than we actually are but I always think about our insides, and really, our insides, what you don't see are in a way sick, or not as healthy as they should be because of the racism that we have to endure.
Paula Edgar: Yep. Which, it's in so many different places, I feel like for me, my lens on what racism and bias and all the other ism, and sexism, the intersections that we are, changed when I became a mother because then it was me, but then it was me and my kids and really thinking about if I don't change the world, what's going to happen to them? I felt like this additional weight of everything I do has to make the world better for them.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Of course. That's why I often think about Black folk having children, us bringing life into the world is an active resistance. It is revolutionary in itself because we are making this conscious decision to bring Black life into this world, especially in a country that doesn't love, appreciate, or care for us. But that's because we know that we want our children to experience joy. We want to make sure that happens. We want to make things better.
Paula Edgar: Yes. I read a story when I was younger. It was something like you may not be the one that's going to change the world, but the way you change the world is by creating the person who changes the world.
I think about that in my children and both of them. But in particular, my son, my son is a cancer survivor. He had cancer when he was one year old. The type of cancer that he had, one out of four children survives. I always think of him as the one.
What does that mean? I remember my therapist being like, “Stop calling that boy the one, he's got enough pressure to think about it.” But it's thinking about when we all show up and we live, what's that blessing? What is going to impact the world? We all have our little ways of doing it.
I just know that my kids will have big ways of doing it because it is what it is. Let's talk about this. You then transition from academia to founding Advancing Health Equity. Why?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Well, because I was plotting along in my academic career at NYU. I thought I was content. But I don't think I ever have really asked myself, “You know, Uché, are you really happy? Is this what you really want?”
I was doing what I thought I was supposed to do. Within medicine, if you have a career in academia, that is what a very small percentage of physicians have. It's considered prestigious. I did love the environment. I found it very intellectually stimulating.
But I was doing a lot on my own. I wasn't getting a lot of mentorship. I wasn't getting a lot of sponsorship. Then seven years and I went up for promotion from assistant to associate professor.
I had done everything I was supposed to do. I was told I had done everything and my promotion was denied by the institutional promotion committee. That was really an eye-opening moment for me because I was like, “Okay, I thought I was doing everything you're supposed to do.” I would think that was a slap that I actually needed just to shake me out of this complacency where I thought that was the environment that I should be in.
I thought that I was doing what I was supposed to be doing. Then I questioned, I said, “Uché, are you being valued? Are you being appreciated?” The answer was no. Then at the same time, I was also in a DEI role at the medical school.
Come to find out it was just a figurehead role. They didn't really expect me to do anything. That was also incredibly demoralizing. It was those moments that added up to me making this decision to say doing work within racial equity, health equity is so incredibly important to you.
But these environments are not ready. Not only are they not ready for you, but they're not going to support you. They're not going to nourish you. You're not going to be able to thrive.
I made this decision that a lot of people in academic medicine do not make where I was like, “You know what, I'm going to leave. I'm going to focus on Advancing Health Equity, my consulting firm and I work part-time in urgent care to pay the bills. That was my plan.
Paula Edgar: Scary, huh? Was it a little frightening for you to do that?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: So, so scary. I think I was in survival mode at the time, but I was also going through a divorce. It was all of these things that were happening in parallel where I was recognizing that I was in this little box. I was actually making myself small, and I was like, “Oh, no, I can't do this anymore.”
Paula Edgar: What do you think about the pandemic, how did that accelerate or make a more focused decision? Because I remember following you on social the whole time. You were a source where we were like, “Okay, what did she say to do? Wear a mask? Okay.”
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. Right. Thank you. I think it was interesting because once I left NYU, that was December 2019, then January or February, I was like, “Okay, this is really nice. This is so chill.” But then, you know what? March happened. What I always say about March 2020, being in New York City, I stayed the course during a time when the waters were very rough.
Staying the course meant that I kept and continued to do the work that I thought was important for us and for our communities. I started writing about what I was seeing in my urgent care practice. I became one of the first voices to call the alarm about racial health inequities. Then I became that person. Then I also felt the urgency to make sure because of what was happening in our government to make sure that we were giving out information that was accurate and responsible, especially to Black communities. So I felt immensely like even though I was going through all this personal turmoil with my divorce and then this career transition, I actually found purpose.
I found even more purpose in my work. I feel like the pandemic has still accelerated that. Unfortunately, Ms. Breonna Taylor and Mr. George Floyd's murders accelerated that too. Even though I had started the company in 2019, the work became even more needed.
Paula Edgar: I just had a memory of the one point you talked about navigating your kids and masks and being outside and I was like, “Okay, whatever she says,” I remember screenshotting it and being like, “Listen everybody.”
But when I think about your brand, it's important. Trust is a huge part of branding. So for people to think that you are someone who I don't know, but I know and feel as if I can trust what you're saying, that in a time when there was so much turmoil and so many places where you are like, ”Can I trust that? I'm not sure,” and I have these kids and my husband, my family to take care of, having you there was really this calm in a storm that was really wild.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Thank you.
Paula Edgar: It just came back to me. I want to thank you because it was a wild time for everyone. I know people are going to be like, “Girl, yes, all of us.” But particularly thinking and realizing that it was impacting Black people in a much more devastating way, that was really scary.
I remember that summer, we used to go to a ranch upstate every summer. The folks were like, “Oh, we're still going to have the ranch.” I was like, “We're Black. We can't go.” You can be all loosey-goosey, but we cannot be loosey-goosey because I don’t know how things are going to be.
Okay. You've gotten into this a bit, but I want to ask specifically, what were some of the most challenging barriers that you've had to encounter while trying to implement change in the healthcare system?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: For us, the work that we do is just so deeply personal. I think sometimes it's hard. My emotions my feelings, all of them get involved in this work. Even my consulting firm is not just a business. I was just talking to one of our team members the other day. For me, this is about building relationships with organizations, with communities. It's so important.
So when there are companies or client organizations that just want to check off the boxes, that don't actually want to put in the time, effort, and resources, that is very, very frustrating to me.
I think the other thing that's frustrating is that despite significant advances in technology, innovation, and research, we still are seeing racial health inequities. We still see a worsening of the Black maternal mortality rate and Black suicide rate.
It feels like sometimes we're the only ones that are very troubled and upset by this. You can't really teach people empathy. I feel like either you have it or you don't. I feel like when it comes to Black folks in our communities, people have an empathy gap with us.
I think for me, that was part of writing a book. How do I communicate to healthcare systems, hospitals, policymakers, and white health professionals, that this kind of situation is unacceptable and unconscionable? Y'all should be embarrassed that in this high-income country, we have Black people living with such poor health, not because of anything that we've done, but because of how our systems work.
Paula Edgar: Yeah. Oh, you almost took my breath away when you said you can't teach empathy. It's so true that the pandemic put a highlight on the fact that no matter what we think, we are all interconnected. The experiences of all of us are interconnected.
Regardless of if you don't on your face care about another group, it still impacts you. I remember having a conversation with someone who was frustrated because his childcare person would not come.
I was like, “She has kids.” Only thinking about his situation. I thought to myself, “Of course, she's afraid because whatever she does with you, she has to bring back home to her children.”
But the empathy wasn't there. I recall having the conversation to say to him, “Let's think about what might be on her mind. Let's think about why it might be challenging so you can kind of get in that space.”
But even still, it's devastating as I read a Times article recently about Black maternal health and it's like I have been so blessed to have wonderful doctors across the spectrum, all races and all genders who have cared for me.
But I also know that I'm a lawyer and I know how to advocate. I think about the people who don't have the voice or the knowledge, and who are fearful of speaking up and the experiences.
Remember when Serena Williams had her health and then Beyonce, those things shone a light on it and then people started to care a little bit more. But even then, it was like, “Oh, right, Black women.”
When you look at society, Black women are a core piece of how our society is able to thrive from back then and still to now. When I was reading your book, it came to me. It was like, you told a lot of stories. You told a story about somebody with sickle cell and I saw about all these things that impact us that folks think that's them. But then we are all interconnected.
All right, tell me what inspired you? What was the catalyst for writing Legacy?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: I have to be honest with you, writing a book wasn't something I ever had truly thought about but I always say that writing Legacy happened because I was doing the work that I was supposed to be doing.
My literary agent, my book agent, heard me on the radio in the summer of 2020 on The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC, and she emailed me. It was like, “Oh, I follow you on social. I just heard you on the radio. I think you have a story to tell, and you're the only person to tell that story.”
We talked and we hit it off. Then I told her my vision for the book. Like, “Okay, if I had to do a book, this is what I would do, use mother's experiences, my experiences, to talk about these larger systemic issues, racism and medicine.”
She's like, “That sounds great.” While it wasn't something that I was working towards, I realized it was somewhat, consciously, it really was something I was always working towards.
I think telling our stories is so very important. It validates and affirms the experiences that we have. The fact that I have experiences as a Black woman, as a Black patient, as a Black physician, to have both those inside and outside experiences, I think gave me a unique perspective to share in this book.
Paula Edgar: Yeah, it's so very well done. I am a judger of audiobooks. Because after law school I don't want to read a book again, I want to just listen to it but I got the book and I listened to it at the same time to navigate my ADHD. But the telling of the story, and I know they sometimes say, “Your first book should let people invest in you and then what you care about,” and it's exactly that. It's exactly that where I was like, “Of course,” where I felt like a cousin from over there that was like, “We're the Black [inaudible],” even though it just was an investment there.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: I was just at a conference. Someone said, “Oh, I feel like I know you because I listened to your audiobook and you were telling your story.” I loved recording the audio, it was such a wonderful experience.
Paula Edgar: Yeah, no, it is great. Again, I judge them because when you feel the emotion, you speak the emotion. It's not just I'm reading the words. So everybody, we'll put the link in the show notes but make sure you do all of the above, get the book and the audiobook.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Thank you.
Paula Edgar: Of course. We got into this a little bit because you talked about the fact that this is not just work for you. A big part of personal branding is showing authenticity and vulnerability. Do you think that that vulnerability piece makes you a better practitioner, a better person that does what you do? How do you navigate that as a Black woman?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. No, I mean, I think it's kind of how I am, just my personality. When I meet people, I'm very much about connecting with people on a very personal, even emotional level. I will share things. But there's a difference between talking to you one-on-one versus doing that when you have a larger platform.
Definitely, there are things that I don't necessarily share now on my social media that I used to maybe four or five years ago. Definitely, it's Black women. We always have to think about protecting ourselves always, always because we are so exposed because we are often so much without protection.
But at the same time, I do think that vulnerability is what allowed people to connect with you and to connect with me. Even writing the book, there were a lot of things that I shared that were my story, my family story.
I remember when the book was about to come out, a few days before, it wasn't as if I had not thought about it, if I said, “Oh, my goodness, all my business is going to be out there,” of course, it's a memoir, so not everything is in there. But a lot was in there that's very dear and personal to me.
But I think that is what moved people, what resonated with people who read the book. That also storytelling, sharing, relating, I think helps people to understand even the larger issues that I talk about in the book.
Paula Edgar: Yeah, I agree. As the people, I agree with that 100%. I came out of hearing it thinking to myself, “This is going to change so many people's lives,” and I want everybody to hear it. I don't want you to just read it because you're interested in medicine. I want you to read it because there is something that you need to hear in this book.
We need to understand our own experiences, should you be a woman, woman of color, Black person, et cetera, but also, if you're not, you need to hear what is happening and what the issues that you're elevating because it impacts all of us.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah, absolutely. It's interesting because I was just talking to my publisher about when the paperback comes out next year, they want to pitch it for the first-year experience to universities, for students to read during freshman year.
I was really excited about that because I always say that I wrote the book for a broad audience. Everyone will get something out of it, but it's also the book that I wish I read when I was younger because it would have given me just a different perspective of what health looks like and just our healthcare system. Health is everything that happens in society and how it impacts us, impacts Black folks proportionately, but it's something that everyone needs to know about.
Paula Edgar: No, 100%. When I was reading, I was thinking about the doctors that I have had and I've had some health issues over the years. I remember there was this one doctor, he was a rheumatologist. I mean, he was dogged. He was like, “I have to figure out what's wrong.”
The fact that he was so invested, I remember he called me on a Sunday and was like, “Go tomorrow to go get a test because I think this might be it.” I remember feeling so loved. It's not an experience that a lot of people have when you think of healthcare.
This was a white man who was just like, “We're going to figure this out.” You talk about there is a phrase that you have called, oh my gosh, I wrote it down and I forgot, I put it on my notes. It's a type of approach to healthcare. What is it?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Oh, I'm culturally responsive?
Paula Edgar: Yeah.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Especially competent. Yeah.
Paula Edgar: Yeah. I thought he was the epitome of that in that he was asking me questions about stress that I had and what about my family and things. I was like, “How did you know this? How did you even know to ask these questions?”
That was one of the things I thought, gosh, when people take this out of here to understand that that is a way in which their experience can be, and those first years that you're talking about, that's the way that they can be in terms of [inaudible], that's going to change the world.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yes. I know, that's why I'm like, “Oh, please, please, please, please, universities, buy this book for your students, have your students read it because the earlier that they read this book, the more that they will be informed.”
Paula Edgar: Agreed. Also, a great graduation present for folks who are pre-med and just thinking about wanting to get yourself prepared and thinking about what type of position you're going to be, I think it just makes total sense.
Okay. You talked about your call to action. You talked about what you wanted folks to do. What are two or three things that you think when people read the book, what do you want them to do? How do you want them to do different based on having read the book?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. I think one thing I would love for people to do, because I know sometimes after they read the book, it feels so overwhelming, I would love for them to look closer to where they are, hyper-local or locally because many of the solutions are in our communities.
Black-led community-based organizations have a lot of the solutions to our healthcare problems. Like I talk about in the book, the birthing center that's in Minneapolis that a Black midwife founded, there are so many very similar programs, even other health-related ones that make a difference in our community, so thinking about how we can support those programs.
The other thing is also thinking about how can we inform our policymakers, whether it’s local, state, federal, about what we need to be healthy. When it comes to Black communities, that's all about investing in Black communities, investing in every aspect, not just making sure that we have access to culturally responsive health care but making sure that we have gained full employment, making sure that our schools are funded.
I want us to have a broader sense of what health looks like, making sure we have paid family leave and sick leave, universal health care. All of that is so important. Those are the kinds of policies that we should be advocating for as communities.
Paula Edgar: Yeah, no, I love that. I think on a personal individual level, I want everybody to read the book and then tell somebody else about what they read and suggest that they read it.
Because to the point of having trusted advisors, I thought of you as a trusted advisor without knowing you, but we have this individual connections with folks in our communities and we're influencers in our communities. If we can share with others what we have learned, we make a difference in wonderful ways.
Speaking of which, I want to give a shout-out to Harlem Acupuncture because it's run by a Black woman and an Asian woman and they are doing God's work there by bringing the stuff from the East to meet with the West.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: I have to check that out.
Paula Edgar: Yes, yes, you do. They're fantastic. Really a great part of my healthcare journey and a lot of others that I know as well. All right. We talked about the call to action. We talked about all these things. Everybody is going to go buy the book. They already know that's in the checklist. I need to know, Dr. Blackstock, what do you do for fun?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: What do I do for fun? Okay, are you taking care of yourself? I love to get together with my girlfriends. I love to go for dinner. I love live shows. I love live hip-hop shows, festivals. And, of course, spending time with my kids is always fun. But I love my girlfriend time, and I also love to travel.
Sometimes I'll travel by myself. Sometimes I'll travel on a girl's trip, but I really enjoy just having that time to connect with my girlfriends, because it makes me remember that even though I hold all of these roles in my life, that really the one that's dearest to me is the one I hold with myself.
Paula Edgar: Oh, I love that. I recently did a panel for an organization I'm involved that’s called My Sister's Keeper and My Brother's Keeper.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Oh, yeah, yeah.
Paula Edgar: We did a panel on our healthcare journeys, and it was me and two of my best friends talking about how we supported each other through our healthcare journeys. It was powerful. I had to bring my own box of Kleenex with me, but it was so powerful.
I thought about our conversation that we were going to have, it was two weeks ago. I thought about the fact that if people understood that having a crew, people who you can rely on is a part of your healthcare journey that you can tell and get recommendations for and share. It just helps with navigating. Sometimes you feel like everything is on your shoulder. If using your crew in that way and your therapist, y'all know, I talk about my therapist.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. I was actually going to say yes. And my therapist has helped me down for the last five years through personal, professional transitions. The day that my book came out, she sent me the most beautiful flowers with the most thoughtful card. I actually put it on my mirror. I read it every day.
Paula Edgar: I love that. Do you feel like it's getting an A from your teacher when your therapist does something?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. Yeah. She's like, “I'm so proud of you. I'm so proud of you.”
Paula Edgar: Yes. Yes. My therapist tells me, “I've grown,” I'm like, “I've grown.”
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yes. Yes. I know. You’re like, “Yay! I did it.”
Paula Edgar: Good. All of you now know that, well, I say it all the time, but your health piece does not fit unless you're actually thinking about your mental health as well. You have to think about all of them.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Absolutely. Oh, yes.
Paula Edgar: All right. We talked about the fun. Everybody in my show gets asked the same two questions. First one is this: I call it the standby of your brand, what is the authentic aspect of your personal brand that you will never, ever compromise on?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Can I say my integrity or no?
Paula Edgar: Of course. Of course. It's your answer.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Okay. I'll say my integrity because I try to be really thoughtful about what I say yes to, what I align myself with, what organizations, what kind of work, what people, I'm very extra thoughtful about that.
Paula Edgar: I mean, which is a brand proposition. Because a big part of your brand is who you align with. I actually love that you pull that out there because we haven't necessarily talked about that as much. Who you say yes to and who you say no to is a big part of your brand. I'm really glad that you pulled that out. That is a takeaway.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yeah. I mean, when I used to be on air a lot, I would tell my agent, “There are certain networks I'm not going on. If they ask for me, just tell them no.”
Paula Edgar: That's not going to work for us. Thanks so much. Love that. All right. Tell me this. Branding Room Only is a playoff of the term standing room only because I'm clever. I want you to talk to me about what you think is that aspect of you that would have people in a room, only standing room, to experience about you?
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Yes. Oh, I think I just have a great way of connecting with people. That's why one reason why I love public speaking and traveling and meeting with different groups to talk about my book, not just my book about, but all the work that I do because I'm able to talk about it and communicate about it in a way that really resonates with people that makes them recall something in their childhood or something they've been through but it makes us connect with each other.
Literally, every time I give a talk, literally, the line is so long, people just want to talk to me and I think it's because I see them, they see me, and we connect on a deeper level. I think it’s just something that I was born with, the ability to connect with people.
Paula Edgar: I want to pull that out for a minute because so often, people will maybe make an answer just like that and not attribute it to the fact that it's just their magic. That's exactly what it is, it's your magic.
There are people who can make standing room and talk about things that are their expertise but how you make you feel part is your magic. I'm really glad you pulled that out because I agree with you.
I want to thank you for sharing your magic and for saying yes to this conversation and for doing the work that you do, which is so needed. Everybody is going to go out and buy this book.
I really hope that this conversation will resonate in so many other places that maybe you haven't touched so that it will broaden the reach of your impact, which has been so, so impactful. Thank you, Dr. Blackstock. I really appreciate you being in the Branding Room.
Dr. Uché Blackstock: Oh, my gosh. Thank you so much, Paula. I had such a wonderful time. This is a very fun conversation.
Paula Edgar: Agreed. Agreed. All right.
Thank you so much for tuning into another wonderful episode of Branding Room Only. It was such a pleasure to have Dr. Uché Blackstock with us today. She shared such a profound story about her experiences and the impact of having a brand that really resonates and represents one's values and aspirations.
Remember that your brand is your story, and it's the power of the story that can change lives, and that's what Dr. Blackstock has done and is doing. Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast platform.
Rate us highly and share this episode with others who might find it impactful. P.S.S Everyone, join us next time as you continue to explore the depths of personal branding with more incredible guests. For now, stand by your brand, y'all. See you soon. Bye.
