I don't know what happened to her afterwards. Join us for an enlightening discussion with Dr. Michele Harper as she highlights the lessons learned on her inspiring personal journey of discovery and self-reflection as written in her New York . Kligman biopsied, burned, and deformed the bodies of prison inmates to study the effects of hundreds of experimental drugs. They stayed together through medical school until two months before she was scheduled to join the staff of a hospital in central . Brought up in Washington, D.C., in a complicated family, she went to . She has taken on many leadership roles . HARPER: First of all, shout out to Lincoln and Lincoln residency because that was one of - professionally, that was one of the most rewarding times of my education and career. There have been clear violations of that mission, deviation from that mission. This is FRESH AIR. She went on to attend Harvard, where she met her husband. Share this page on Facebook. So I could relate to that. By Katie Tamola Published: Jul 17, 2020. Its been an interesting learning curve, Im quicker on the uptake about choosing who gets my energy. Now, of course, there are choices. (SOUNDBITE OF TAYLOR HASKINS' "ALBERTO BALSALM"), DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. Our mission is to get Southern California reading and talking. But Im trying to figure out how to detonate my life to restructure and find the time to write the next book.. There was nothing to it. We'll continue our conversation in just a moment. HARPER: Well, what it would have entailed - in that case, what it would have entailed was we would have had to somehow subdue this man, since he didn't want an exam - so we would have to physically restrain him somehow, which could mean various nurses, techs, security, hold him down to get an evaluation from him, take blood from him, take urine from him, make him get an X-ray - probably would take more than physically if he would even go along with it. I am famously bad at social media. Fax: 1-512-324-7555. DAVIES: You describe an incident in which a patient was brought in - I guess was handcuffed to a chair, and there were four police officers there who said he swallowed a bag of drugs, and they wanted him treated, I guess, you know, the stomach pumped or whatever. HARPER: Well, it's difficult. Whatever their wounds, whatever their trauma, it can make them act in this way. Do you know what I mean? She was saying, "Leave. And in this case, the resident, who kind of tried to go over your head to the hospital, was a white person. Racism affects everything with my work as a doctor. And their next step was an attempt to destroy her career. Dr. Michael Harper, MD is an Internal Medicine Specialist in Sellersburg, IN and has over 28 years of experience in the medical field. While she waited for her brother she watched and marveled as injured patients were rushed in for treatment, while others left healed. As for sex, about 35.8% were female.]. Dr. Michele Harper. DAVIES: Right. And it just - something about it - I couldn't let it go. When I left the room, I found out that the police officer had said that he was going to try to arrest me for interfering with his investigation. Please register to receive a link for viewing this online event. So it felt particularly timely that, for The . And even clinically, when I'm not, like when I worked at Einstein Hospital in Philadelphia, it's a similar environment. Just as Harper would never show up to examine a patient without her stethoscope, the reader should not open this book without a pen in hand. There are so many barriers to entry in medicine for people of color: the cost of medical school, wage gaps, redlining, access to good public education and more. Shane, Dr. Michelle's spouse, is a fireman and the Deputy Conservation Officer. I will tell you, though, that the alternative comes at a much higher cost because I feel that in that case, for example, it was an intuition. The constant in Dr. Harper's reflection on these patients is the importance of connection, the importance of asking the hard . She remained stuporous. This man has personal sovereignty. And that continued until, I guess, your high school years, because you actually drove your brother to the emergency room. In one chapter, she advocates for a Black man who has been brought in in handcuffs by white police officers and refuses an examination a constitutional right that Harper honors despite a co-worker calling a representative from the hospitals ethics office to report her. It's emotionally taxing. Dr. Michele Harper, THE BEAUTY IN BREAKING. Washington University School of Medicine, MSCI. You know, ER doctors and nurses have a lot of dealings with police, and there's a lot of talk about reforming police these days, you know, defunding police in the wake of protests of police killings of African Americans. She was a Black patient. DAVIES: Have things improved? DAVIES: You know, you write in the book that you navigate an American landscape that claims to be post-racial when every waking moment reveals the contrary. But it was a byproduct. You were the attending person who was actually her supervisor, but she thought she could take this into her own hands. Michele Harper grew up in Washington, DC, knowing from a fairly young age that healing would be in her future. It's people outside of your departments. This happens all the time, where prisoners are brought in, and we do what the police tell us to do. Michele Harper, The Beauty in Breaking. As an effective ER physician, br. Let me reintroduce you. While Harper says shes superstitious about sharing the topic of her next book so early in the process, she is yearning to continue writing. There was nothing to complain about. DAVIES: The resident in this case who sought to go over your head and consult with the hospital's legal department - did you continue to work with her? In her new memoir, she shares some memorable stories of emergency medicine - being punched in the face by a young man she was examining, helping a woman in a VA hospital with the trauma of sexual assault she suffered serving in Afghanistan and treating a man for a cut on his hand who turned out to have incurred the wound while stabbing a woman to death. As she puts it, In life, too, even greater brilliance can be found after the mending., Who Saves an Emergency Room Doctor? Each milestone came with challenges: Harpers father tried to pass himself off as the wind beneath her wings at her medical school graduation, and her marriage to her college sweetheart fell apart at the end of her residency in the South Bronx. Know My Name, by Chanel Miller. She was there with her doting father. You say that this center has the sturdy roots of insight that, in their grounding, offer nourishment that can lead to lives of ever-increasing growth. NPR's Scott Simon speaks to Dr. Michele Harper about her new memoir, The Beauty in Breaking. And I specifically don't speak about much of that time and I mentioned how graduation from undergrad was - pretty much didn't go because it was tough being a Black woman in a predominantly white, elitist institution. And you - I guess, gradually, you kept some contact with your father, then eventually cut off Off contact altogether. This was a middle-aged white woman, and she certainly didn't know anything about me because I had just walked into the room and said my name. You've also worked in big-city teaching hospitals where that was not as much the case, I assume. The past few nights shes treated heart and kidney failure, psychosis, depression, homelessness, physical assault and a complicated arm laceration in which a patient punched a window and the glass won. DAVIES: You know, the ER doctor has these intense encounters, but they're usually one-time events. . So that's what she was doing. Join our community book club. She went on to attend Harvard, where she met her husband. After a childhood in Washington, D.C., she studied at Harvard University and the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University. Some salient memories that just remind me of the insecurity of it - there would always be some kind of physical violence. Maternal-Fetal Medicine Specialist, Comprehensive Fetal Care Center. The authoritative record of NPRs programming is the audio record. Her cries became more and more distressed. I love the protests. It's not graphic, but it is troubling. and an older woman carrying the burdens of a sick husband and differently abled grandchild. The gash came from Harpers fathers teeth. And, you know, of note, Dominic, the patient, and I were the two darkest-skinned people in the department. And in that story and after - when I went home and cried, that was a moment where that experience allowed me to be honest. THE BEAUTY IN BREAKING (Riverhead, 280 pp., $27) is the riveting, heartbreaking, sometimes difficult, always inspiring story of how she made this happen. Read an excerpt from chapter 1: With the final DC home, house number three, we had arrived on the "Gold Coast.". I mean, yeah, the pain of my childhood in that there wasn't, like you said, an available rescue option at that point gave me the opportunity as I was growing up to explore that and to heal and think to myself I want to be part of that safety net for other people when it's possible. It was fogging up. Is it my sole responsibility to do that? While she waited for John, she took in the scene in the emergency room: an old man napping, a young man waiting for a ride home, a father rushing through sliding doors with his little girl in his arms. Michele Harper: Processing what she saw in and out of the ER. The past few nights she's treated . "was reminded, too, of Dr. Albert Kligman's experiments on imprisoned men in Philadelphia from the 1950s to the 1970s. Michele Harper is a graduate of Harvard University and the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University. You write that the hospital would be so full of patients that some would wait in the ER, and then you would be expected to care for them in addition to those arriving for emergency care. It's many people. MAKE AN APPOINTMENT CALL (302)644-8880. None of us knew what was happening. Michele Harper, 2020. Theres a newborn who isnt breathing; a repeat visitor whose chart includes a violent behavior alert; a veteran who opens up about what shes survived; an older man who receives a grim diagnosis with grace and humor. I mean, was it difficult? It's 11 a.m., and Michele Harper has just come off working a string of three late shifts at an emergency room in Trenton, N.J. 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