Race, Ethnicity and Quality Of Care: Inequalities and Incentives

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Abstract
As was my custom, I moved from one exam room to the next with a fluidity that comes from years of practice, yet I was stopped in my tracks when Mr. North rose to his feet to greet me. His deep ebony, six foot-three-inch frame dwarfed my pale, five-foot-three presence. The tremendous hands on his 260 pound body grabbed my own outstretched right hand and shook it…. I glanced at his face, trying to see through my initial discomfort, only to be greeted by my own face staring back at me from the silver, reflective sunglasses he wore beneath a baseball cap that covered his head and any hair that might have been growing on it. His huge chest was tightly wrapped in a black T-shirt that, even in its largest version, couldn't stretch comfortably to encompass his pectoral girth….Mr. North became one of my favorite patients….I like him because I realize how hard I have had to work all of my life to overcome the racist feelings that made me fear him when we first met and that never allow me to act completely naturally in his presence.