Episode 105: Michael Frakes on Doctor Diversity and Racial Health Differences

Michael Frakes is a Professor of Law and Professor of Economics at Duke University

The paper discussed in this episode is this one.

This paper studies whether the racial diversity of medical providers (mostly doctors) in the hospital, affects the health outcomes of minority patients. There is a big effect and, most importantly, it does not only operate through the concordance between individual patient and individual doctor: having more diverse doctors in the hospital generates positive externalities that go beyond the patient-doctor relation.

Other articles discussed in this episode are:

ALSAN, M., GARRICK, O. and GRAZIANI, G. (2019), “Does Diversity Matter for Health? Experimental Evidence from Oakland”, American Economic Review, 109, 4071–4111.

ALSAN, M. and WANAMAKER, M. (2018), “Tuskegee and the Health of Black Men”, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 133, 407–455.