American Board of Emergency Medicine Closed for Debate on DEI

Like many other institutions, the American Board of Emergency Medicine (ABEM) accelerated its promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion after the killing of George Floyd and its public statement on systemic racism in June of 2020.

Four years later, there is now little room left for debate within the organization.

In early 2022, ABEM’s Board of Directors declared diversity, equity, and inclusion a “strategic imperative.” A new committee on DEI was tasked with reviewing ABEM documentation, studying the perceptions of DEI among ABEM stakeholders, and working with external consultants to create new recommendations to advance DEI.

ABEM also developed the Dr. Leon Haley, Jr. Bridge to the Future of Emergency Medicine Academy, a multi-week, all-expenses-paid mentorship program limited to medical students of certain races and identities prioritized by ABEM.

In July 2023, ABEM doubled down, issuing a revised Code of Professionalism that requires board-eligible and certified physicians to agree to “mitigate both implicit or explicit biases based on race, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, national origin, or religion when providing patient care.”

Then, in November 2023, these efforts culminated in the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education awarding the Barbara Ross-Lee, D.O., Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Award to ABEM.

ABEM’s has transformed itself so rapidly that it has left little time or space for important questions about the foundations of its DEI policies. A major justification for DEI as an institutional priority was, for example, the claim by ABEM’s board of directors that diversity “leads to better patient care” served as a major justification for DEI as an institutional priority.

Of course, that claim is echoed by many other medical institutions, such as the American Association of Medical Colleges.

Yet, most of the evidence used to support the connection between race and patient outcomes does not actually evaluate outcomes, but perceptions of outcomes. This difference is subtly conceded by the AAMC. But even among studies that examine patient perceptions of outcomes based on the race of their doctors, the evidence is mixed.

Even the AAMC concedes the lack of evidence behind the claim that racial concordance between patients and doctors affects health outcomes: “that actual direct linkage… it’s not there.”

That concession, however, does not prevent AAMC, ABEM, or any other medical institution from continuing to spread misinformation about the link between the race of doctors and patient outcomes.

ABEM’s embrace of DEI and the lack of debate about its foundation are not unique. But the accelerated pace of change happening there serves as a cautionary example for other organizations that have not yet gone so far.