Professor argues cancer research not antiracist enough, offers antiracist approaches to patient engagement

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A University of Maryland professor recently gave a presentation arguing that principles of "antiracism" must be incorporated into cancer research.

Maryland professor Christabel Cheung delivered a presentation as part of a symposium hosted by the University of Michigan School of Social Work on "Achieving Health Equity in Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Psycho-Oncology Care." 

AYA oncology is defined by the National Cancer Institute as cancer care or research that's aimed toward cancer patients between the ages of 15 to 39 years old. 

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Cheung's presentation, titled "Antiracist Patient Engagement in Adolescent & Young Adult Oncology Research and Advocacy," cited much of the work of Ibram X. Kendi, the architect of antiracist ideology.

Cheung based her definition of antiracism through the lens of Kendi's work, maintaining the notion that "there is no such thing as not being racist ... the heartbeat of racism domestically in the United States has been denial of racism, and the sound of that heartbeat has been the argument, ‘I’m not a racist.’"

Cheung goes on to say, "He encourages us to take on the perspective that we’re either being anti-racist where we’re promoting equality or we’re being racist in a sense that we’re working in systems either being complicit or actually supporting racist approaches."

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Woman with doctor in doctor's office (iStock)

The Maryland professor also broke down "anti-racist approaches to patient engagement." She said that she studied 32 exclusively BIPOC AYA cancer patients, asking them to share their experiences when transparency, honesty, and trust are violated. 

She wanted to take those experiences to offer policy-makers, practitioners, and researchers best practices in "how to better engage BIPOC AYA cancer patients in order to improve the knowledge, center-patient wisdom, and prevent unnecessary suffering that is happening right now." 

"The number one core value identified by both professionals and BIPOC AYAs themselves was the value of transparency, honesty, and trust across the research process," Cheung said.

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Furthermore, Cheung’s research provided recommendations for "advancing antiracist approaches" for AYA cancer patients.

The recommendations included "avoid[ing] persistent tokenism" with non-White cancer patients. Speaking from personal experience as a patient, Cheung explained that she was tokenized as the "Asian girl with the service dog."

A doctor in Mount Sinai Hospital Service's new mobile cancer unit shakes the hand of a patient (Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai/Tisch Cancer Center)

"We knew who the Black male gay AYA representative was. We became tokenized in those roles, and it was unfair to us and unfair to the entire population because we could not possibly represent the range of issues that all marginalized and minoritized AYAs faced."

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Cheung and the University of Michigan School of Social Work did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment.