White Supremacy in the Health System

Event Description: 

This discussion-focused meeting will center on exposing the explicit and implicit ways that white supremacy pervades the health system and perpetuates injustice. We will discuss the biomedical power structure and the cultural norms that uphold asymmetrical power dynamics. We will reflect on ways in which we, as health professionals, can resist white supremacy from within the system. Alternatives to hierarchical power structures and deficit-minded patient narratives will be presented. A multi-media resource list on whiteness and white supremacy will be provided to facilitate further self-exploration on the deep rooted structural and social norms that underlie health and social inequity.

Register here: https://pdx.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEtde-uqTkuHdRFIdgZTY0jxvRlCf1bP2It#/registration 

Our Host: 

Noriko Yamaguchi, PT, DPT is a physical therapist based in Portland, OR and dabbles in patient care, teaching, and learning. She is an outpatient clinician at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) specializing in patients with chronic conditions, such as long COVID, hypermobility, and cancer. She is an adjunct assistant professor in the School of Physical Therapy at Pacific Northwest University (PNWU) in Yakima, WA, where she teaches in the ethics/professionalism and special populations curricular tracks and assists with the pro bono clinic for the farmworker community. Lastly, she is pursuing a PhD in Community Health at the OHSU/Portland State University School of Public Health, where she is interested in studying the structural, symbolic, and everyday violence imposed by the health system on the bodies of minoritized communities.