HBCUs Can Play a Vital Role in Creating a Well-trained, Diverse Field of Healthcare Professionals

It has been just a few years since the COVID-19 pandemic struck a devastating blow to public health and the economy, but with the national joblessness rate below four percent and hundreds of thousands of jobs being added to the American economy every month, the country has ample reason to cheer. This turnaround is remarkable and a welcome sign of U.S. resilience. But our celebration needs to be tempered by an awareness of the challenges that remain. Among these is the urgent need for skilled healthcare professionals for balanced racial representation within these professions.

After all, despite the encouraging recent employment news, the health professions to which I have devoted my career as a scientist and educator of new generations have never had a greater need for a highly skilled workforce. They also remain stubbornly unrepresentative of the nation’s population. Less than five percent of medical doctors are African Americans, for example, although Blacks make up roughly 13 percent of the U.S. population. Enrollment of Black men in medical school, at just over three percent, has barely budged in 45 years. Nor has African American representation kept pace in other key medical fields like public health, psychology, speech pathology, and pharmaceutical studies.

No wonder a 2022 report from the Urban Institute found that the lack of diversity in the healthcare workforce risks undermining both patient-provider relationships and actual patient health outcomes. It’s not just that patients of color are much less likely than white patients to report having healthcare providers of the same race, there is also profound underrepresentation in the biomedical research community that propels advances in healthcare. It is a representative community of researchers that will pose questions and prioritize diagnostic and therapeutic innovation that will serve a richly diverse population, not only the fortunate majority.

As the nation’s largest educator of future Black physicians, as well as the only Roman Catholic institution among the country’s 107 historically Black colleges and universities, Xavier University of Louisiana (XULA) believes it has a mission and calling to fill these talent gaps necessary for the nation, especially its healthcare workforce. This is why with Oschsner Health, we’re planning a new medical school and also growing our undergraduate pipeline preparing well-qualified students to proceed to medical study. By showing what we do and why we do it, we show what is possible with a rich trove of talent among our young. We are mindful that our educational efforts not only benefit our students individually but our communities and nation. 

In rededicating ourselves to the post-pandemic need for many more well-trained and diverse health care professionals, we believe other HBCUs can play a decisive role as well. Just as land grant universities and community colleges emerged to reshape higher education for the greater good at crucial moments in our nation’s history, the recent surge in HBCU enrollment and rise in federal and philanthropic funding perfectly positions these institutions to respond to U.S. talent needs in general and in both reshaping and enriching the U.S. healthcare workforce.

Remember, HBCUs have already done many impressive things in service to the nation, producing notable leaders across the wide-ranging domains and disciplines. These institutions can do even more. With demand for diverse health care professionals so high, and student demand continuing to be strong, I’m convinced that Xavier and other HBCUs can play a key part in shoring up the talent gap in these vital fields. The three following steps would be a great place to start:

• Getting involved earlier in strengthening the education pipeline. Ask any member of a professional orchestra when their interest in music began. You will not hear of college or conservatory classes, but of a passion ignited in third or fourth grade. It is also the case for health professionals and scientists whose passions emerge in earlier years. This is why diversifying the medical professional pipeline has to begin well before college. Universities can play a role by bringing young students to campus for stimulating programs, whether in creative writing, biology or computer science, that plant seeds for future interests and enthusiasms. Unfortunately, we see ample evidence that many students do not have access to rich academic preparation in secondary school. When Black, Hispanic, and Asian students have equivalent grades, test scores, and course-taking patterns, they actually attend college at a rate roughly five percentage points higher than white students with similar academic preparation, according to a recent Brookings Institution study. Equal educational experience yields equal or superior results. Too often, unfortunately, equal education isn't the case.

• Combining unstinting support for students with a commitment to filling academic gaps. What XULA and other colleges can control, once undergraduates arrive on campus, is our unwavering commitment to their potential and to remedying whatever academic gaps may be standing in the way of their future progress. That often takes the form of committed faculty. One of our alumni, now a very successful surgeon, shares that a professor who demanded much of him, who he resented as a student, is at the top of his list to visit today. That embracing faculty love and expectation propelled him, as it has many others.

• Getting smart about using tests to pinpoint weaknesses and then to shore them. Many in the academy have mixed feelings about standardized tests. But there’s no question that they can be useful diagnostics to identify where earlier education had not met the need. For many students, cost and obligation to work during the summer. may preclude opportunity to prepare for the MCAT well ahead of applying to medical school. XULA’s partnership with Kaplan permits our students to prepare for and take these exams multiple times at no cost, with plenty of time to shore up any weaknesses that the tests identify.

We're proud of the specific strategies and dedicated individuals we have at XULA, and our sister colleges and universities are also doing valuable work. What’s crucial is that we waste no time, and must let no minds waste. We must do more to educate and support the wide range of diverse students whose talents are needed to make our healthcare system both more representative and more effective and to serve the needs of a nation.