The first step in addressing racial disparities in healthcare is an acknowledgment that there is a problem. Clinicians have an obligation to recognize how racism shows up in healthcare and in turn how it affects racially marginalized patients. Clinicians must engage in self-reflection by assessing their own conscious and unconscious biases that impact the clinician/patient dyad, by understanding their social location, and by using interventions that are grounded in cultural humility and awareness of racial trauma.
We will review the process of creating educational opportunities for clinicians to help them identify bias and racism in themselves and throughout the healthcare system, to embrace intentional antiracist practice, and better advocate for BIPOC/AAPI patients and colleagues. The strategies include the development of an antiracism committee, the use of a social location exercise to influence and disrupt white supremacy, the creation of community guidelines for engaging in conversations about race, and ensuring a commitment to antiracist social work practice.
This presentation will examine racism in healthcare, the psychological impact of racism when working with patients, techniques for clinicians in the healthcare system to address their own biases, and implications for practice.
Learning Objectives:
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To explore unconscious biases that impede the therapeutic relationship
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To examine ways to foster and adopt cultural humility as an integral aspect of person-centered care
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To identify ways that racism manifests in the medical setting and how it causes/perpetuates racial
- To examine how the use of social location supports antiracist clinical practice
Presenters:
Linda Mathew, MSW, DSW, LCSW-R, is a Social Work Manager at Memorial Sloan-Kettering (MSK) Cancer Center. She has been in the field of healthcare for 23 years and is certified in CBT, meaning-centered psychotherapy, and palliative and end-of-life care. Dr. Mathew earned her MSW and DSW from NYU’s Silver School of Social Work (NYUSSW). She co-created REACH for Caregivers and co-led the Talking with Children About Cancer Programs at MSK. Dr. Mathew is an antiracist practitioner and an active member of MSK Social Work Department’s Antiracism Committee.
Dr. Mathew has received the prestigious Mid-Career Exemplary Leadership Award and Excellence in Clinical Practice Award from the Social Work Hospice and Palliative Care Network and the National Association of Social Workers. She is a master trainer for ESPEC: Educating Social Workers in Palliative and End-of-life Care. Dr. Mathew serves on several professional boards, including, ESPEC and AOSW, as well as several editorial boards. Dr. Mathew has presented locally and nationally; and she is a published author. Dr. Mathew believes in giving back to the field of social work through her role as an adjunct faculty member of NYUSSW and Smith College. She maintains a private practice.
Chantelle Brown, LMSW is a Clinic Therapist at the Ackerman Institute for the Family and an alum of both Ackerman’s Clinical Externship Program in Family Therapy and Social Work and Diversity Program. She is a graduate of the Silberman School of Social Work at Hunter College and has special training in mindfulness and compassion-based contemplative psychotherapy from the Nalanda Institute for Contemplative Science. Chantelle has a special focus on teaching embodied approaches to contemplative practice and exploring methods to integrate trauma in healing.
Chantelle previously worked at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, where she trained in a post-graduate clinical fellowship in oncology social work and palliative care, and served as a clinical social worker supporting patients and their families along the continuum of care.
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When Racism is Life-Threatening: Clinical Strategies for Interrupting Racism and Addressing Racial Trauma in Healthcare
June 14, 2024
10:00 am - 1:00 pm
Linda Mathew, MSW, DSW, LCSW-R and Chantelle Brown, MSW, LMSW
3 CE Contact Hours
Online