Dr. Sally Satel Comments on Excellence over Identity in Medicine

Dr. Sally Satel, American Enterprise Institute senior fellow and lecturer at the Yale University School of Medicine, penned a February 6 guest post for the Unsafe Science Substack that urged a refocus on what academic excellence in medical education means.

Citing a recent Perspective feature article in the New England Journal of Medicine titled “Centering Women of Color to Promote Excellence in Academic Medicine,” Dr. Satel challenged the injustices in NIH funding and career advancement the authors allege.

“I am not persuaded that “centering” women of color – or any group for that matter – is a path to academic distinction,” Satel wrote. “Increasing diversity is not necessarily in tension with academic merit—and in general, worth striving for, but not at the expense of excellence.” She concluded, “The proposals from these authors will not promote excellence. In academic medicine, that must take precedence.”

Do No Harm founder and chairman Dr. Stanley Goldfarb encourages members to review her post. “Sally Satel is an American treasure,” he said. “She is a psychiatrist and an author who has written extensively on the issues of the problems that progressivism has brought to American medical education and healthcare. Her latest article beautifully shows the foolishness of applying identity politics to the research establishment.”

Read the full guest post here.