On the Need for Diversity in Medical Illustrations

The Dose

In medical school, students learning about illness, pathology, and disease are trained almost exclusively on images of white patients. Even materials on illnesses that predominantly affect Black people, like sickle cell disease, and textbooks used in medical schools in countries where most people are Black, are filled with illustrations of white bodies and white skin. This leaves doctors underprepared to care for Black patients.

For Nigerian medical student and illustrator Chidiebere Ibe, accurate representation is a starting point for health care equity. Ibe has founded Illustrate Change, the world's largest open-source digital library of medical illustrations featuring people of color.

In the newest episode of The Dose podcast, host Joel Bervell talks to Ibe about his efforts to make inclusive imagery widely accessible — a critical step toward building health systems that can provide Black patients with the care they deserve. This is the third episode in a new series of conversations with leaders at the forefront of health equity.