Black Harvard doctor pens memoir of Jim Crow South

BOSTON (AP) - The book covers his life as the first African-American to graduate from Stanford Medical School and becoming the first black department head at Harvard's teaching hospitals...

TheGrio Staff

Dec 25, 2010

BOSTON (AP) — A black Harvard surgeon who grew up in segregated Memphis during Jim Crow is set to release a book about his life and his call to end health care disparities.

Augustus White III is scheduled next month to publish “Seeing Patients: Unconscious Bias in Health Care.” The 74-year-old orthopedic surgeon says the book is a lifelong project that is a combination of his experience growing up and his mission to end bias care he’s noticed as a medical professional.

The book covers his life as the first African-American to graduate from Stanford Medical School and becoming the first black department head at Harvard’s teaching hospitals.

White, who now lives in Westin, Mass., calls the health care disparities the last frontier of racial prejudice.