Ra\u00fal: Record.\u00a0 And hello, this is Ra\u00fal Necochea from the Department of Social Medicine at the UNC School of Medicine. And today is December 13.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nI\u2019m here with Dr. Allen Mask for the Black Alumni Experience project of the Office of Medical Education. Hello, Dr. Mask.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Hello. Good afternoon.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: The first question that I wanted to ask you is very simple: Can you just tell us about your date of birth and place of birth?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Mm-hmm. Well, I grew up in Hamlet, North Carolina, a small railroad town about an hour and a half from here. I was born in 1952. Went to undergraduate school at Carolina but graduated from Hamlet High School. I started off in segregated schools; schools are segregated from the first until the 10th grade. In fact, my father was the principal of the elementary school, A.G. Mask, Sr. and my uncle, J.W. Mask, Sr. was actually the principal of the high school. In my 11th grade year, the schools were integrated. Then I went from Monroe Avenue High School, where my uncle was the principal, to Hamlet High School. I did my last two years there and then I came onto UNC after that.<\/p>\n
\nHamlet is a railroad town. It\u2019s a wonderful place to have grown up. It\u2019s, like Charles Dickens, it was probably the \u201cbest of times,\u201d and \u201cthe worst of times.\u201d It was in apartheid, southern United States. And so, we had lack of access to hotels and we weren\u2019t welcomed into restaurants and movie theaters and so forth, but at the same time, we had our own communities.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nWe had an excellent education system. Most of the instructors I had when we went to the predominant-Black schools had master\u2019s degrees, there was a lot of passion there. Of course, we had used school buses and used textbooks and so forth, but nonetheless, we had the richness of great instructors and people who really cared about us and really pushed us, for example, to get a good education.<\/p>\n
\nFor example, I can remember in the seventh and eighth grade doing practice SAT tests because our instructors realized that we need to take the SAT tests in 11th grade, and they started us very early doing that. My father finished St. Augustine University in Raleigh. He has a master\u2019s degree from NYU. He spent his career as a principal. My mother\u2019s a music teacher originally from New Orleans, Louisiana. Came to Bennett College in Greensboro, North Carolina to get her degree in music. Did her practice teaching in Hamlet and met my father, they got married, and the rest is all history.<\/p>\n
\nThere are three of us. My sister is an administrator at Wake Medical Center. Her name is Jane. She has two Masters: a Masters in Speech and a Masters degree in Health Education. She\u2019s an administrative weight medical center in Raleigh. Our brother\u2019s a radiologist. He graduated from UNC with Honors in the late 1980s. Got his medical degree at Duke, did his internship and residency in California, Pasadena, then went to the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York, and then came to Richmond, Virginia. Then went to New Orleans to Tulane. The bottom line is that he eventually became a radiologist and he\u2019s practicing radiology right now.<\/p>\n
\nI came to UNC as a premed student \u2013 really unintentionally. I\u2019d gotten a scholarship from Jefferson Productions, Jefferson Power Productions in Radio, Television, and Motion Pictures. I really had intended to be a broadcaster.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And \u2013 yeah. And then, I spent one summer as part of a leadership program at UNC called \u201cThe North Carolina Fellows Program\u201d working at WBTB in Charlotte, and then got really interested in medicine. And just a 30-second caveat on that, I was supposed to rotate through marketing and through sales and through the newsroom, and I started off in the newsroom. And my second day there, I went out with a reporter to do a story at UNC Charlotte. And he says, \u201cOh, you gonna do the story.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Ha.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Pretty mean. I said, \u201cI just got here.\u201d He goes, \u201cNo, you\u2019re gonna do it.\u201d So, he set me in front of the camera and we did 20 takes of something or the other. And he brought it back to the manager and director guy by the name of Ron de Paulis and he showed info \u2013 he said, \u201cRon, Allen did the story.\u201d And Ron knocked everything off his desk and said, \u201cGD, Ken Kunsch, you don\u2019t have the right to make those decisions. This kid just got here, what are you doing? This is my newsroom.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nAnd he went back \u2013 this is during the time of film, not video tapes \u2013 so, they processed the film and then he looked at it, and his worries were \u201cit\u2019s acceptable.\u201d And then I spent the whole summer not rotating through anything, but I was in the newsroom on the air. And I met a guy there that went onto become a faculty member at UNC, Dr. Leslie Walton, W-A-L-T-O-N; he was a GYN surgeon there. And that really changed my interests from broadcasting to premed.<\/p>\n
\nSo, did premed, got accepted to my first choice of medical school at UNC. And I\u2019m gonna leave you some notes that is typed up roughly that\u2019s going to talk a little bit about the experience there. I got accepted to medical school that January, did the MED program that summer. I still remember the names of the administrators: Ms. Evelyn McCarthy, Dr. Marion Phillips. Faculty members: Dr. Edith MacRae, Dr. Fred Dowdoff, Dr. Reddick.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd we had a beautiful program there. There were twenty or thirty MED students.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: MED, as I understand it now, is really geared more towards kids who want to go to medical school and they need to get a head start, and to prove themselves that, \u201cI can really do the work.\u201d Back then when we were doing it, we had all been accepted to medical school. And so, it was an introductory phenomenon for us.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, we took anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, microbiology, histology, bioethics, some medical terminology, some basic, basic Latin.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Latin?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Latin, exactly. We did some basic Latin as well.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Huh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And so, that helped us with all of the medical terminology and so forth. And so, we \u2013 starting the first class in medical school, I\u2019d say in late-August or early-September \u2013 we had already had all of this stuff we were starting off with. Anatomy and the histology and a microbiology. Are you kidding me? We knew all that stuff.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: So, it was the summer before you \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: The summer before we started medical school. And I still remember we did all of our work in Berryhill. There were pods of four students. And it was one professor, I don\u2019t recall his name now, who went on to become a professor in hematology at UNC. He first got there, the microscopes were in a wooden box; he couldn\u2019t even figure out how to get his microscope out of the box. And I was like, \u201cYou kidding me, right?\u201d And so, it was a little hook and I had to go show him how to hook it out. And he took it out, and I say, \u201cOh, yeah. Now I see what\u2019s going on.\u201d Yeah, I said, \u201cWell, you\u2019re gonna really be competitive here if you couldn\u2019t even figure out how to get the microscope out of the box.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nSo, anyway, we had some wonderful camaraderie, I think, with the faculty and staff and the students. We were all committed, we all got along very well. And that MED program was a strong start to our medical experience. We developed a lot of camaraderie in the laboratories. In the anatomy lab, for example, where we were four people to a body and we all developed strong friendships around there. I remember us being very grateful to the human beings who had donated their bodies to medical science. And in fact, I remember we nicknamed our cadaver \u201cOscar.\u201d And we spent probably a whole year doing those dissections.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Our grading was on a pass\/fail scale. So, it wasn\u2019t like we were competing for A\u2019s and B\u2019s. But I can remember we were worried about graduating and so, they would post our grades based on our Social Security numbers. And we would literally go up and see our Social Security number without any regard for what the number was, because I knew that as long as I was in the top 20, 30 percent, nobody was gonna flunk me. And as long as I\u2019m there, I\u2019m riding that wave, I\u2019m graduating.<\/p>\n
\nIt was interesting. I still remember that phenomenon, because I really didn\u2019t care so much whether it was a 92 or an 87. I\u2019d look up and I\u2019d see a flash and see my Social Security number, and then I was gone because I knew I would do well then.<\/p>\n
\nSo, we had our first two years of the classroom work, which was excellent. Again, we were boosted by the experience in the MED program. I got a chance to meet a guy by the name Dr. John Parker, who was a hematologist at UNC. He taught me physical examination. Of course, that was the end of our second year, our first opportunity to get involved in some clinical work. We enjoyed that very much.<\/p>\n
\nThe third and fourth year were great experiences mostly because we did most of our third-year work at UNC. But we were given the opportunity to do rotations in other countries, in other cities. So, I spent the summer in Trinidad, West Indies, studying \u2013<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Studying Tropical Medicine. I spent six weeks at McLean Hospital at Harvard Medical School studying psychiatry. I spent six weeks at Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, where my uncle is also a physician. Studying OB-GYN there. Then, of course, locally, I spent a six-week rotation in Greensboro, a six-week rotation in Charlotte, a six-week rotation in Wilmington.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, it was really nice to be able to get out of Chapel Hill for a while. I also spent \u2013 I didn\u2019t mention on the sheet, but I spent also six weeks at UC San Francisco studying cardiology. So, it was nice to be able to get out of Chapel Hill to have an opportunity to see Harvard Medical School, to go to the University of the West Indies to study medicine, to go to UC San Francisco where I worked with a guy by the name of Dr. Canoe Chanegy, who was an internationally well-respected cardiologist.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd so, I eventually applied for my internship and residency. I got my first choice. I went to Mass General Hospital in Harvard Medical School. And I can talk a little about internships and residency. Anything else you wanna talk about as far as the medical school experience?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I would love to go back over some of the things that you said, but you\u2019re on a roll. So \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay. Well, I sorta have in my mind what I wanna talk about, but one other thing I wanted to mention about the UNC experience. We celebrate the Zollicoffer Lecture Series.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yes.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: But the Zollicoffer Lecture Series really started before 1981. In 1977, Dr. Marion Phillips and some members of the Student National Medical Association and I had the idea of bringing in Black medical faculty to do a lecture series. And we were doing it for two reasons, not so much just that we wanted the enrichment of meeting Black faculty and so forth and ourselves, but we wanted the White faculty to know that, \u201cDon\u2019t think that we\u2019re all neophytes at this.\u201d That we\u2019re all new, gonna make these Black-folk doctors, and aren\u2019t you so glad to be here, and you\u2019ve never done this before. Our purpose was to say to them, \u201cWe\u2019ve been here before.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nSo, we brought in Dr. Wilbert Jordan, who had trained and he had gone to the Cleveland Clinic for medical school. He did his internship and residency at Beth Israel Hospital of Harvard Hospital. He was originally from Arkansas and so, he was a specialist in \u2013 also, not a specialist, he was also very well versed in voodoo medicine.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And so, the word got out that he was coming. So, we had the News & Observer there, the Durham Herald, the Greensboro newspaper was there, the local television stations were there. At the time, it was the largest gathering of anybody we\u2019d ever gathered in Berryhill Hall.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: The place was packed. And Wilbert said to me \u2013 Dr. Jordan said to me before went, he said, \u201cHey, wait a minute. I thought I was speaking to just sort of a small seminar.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: There were throngs of people there.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And he\u2019s very loquacious, very animated guy. He came in and did a beautiful job. I can still remember Dr. Chris Fordham who was there, just looking around, just sort of taking in all of the sights of all the people who were there.<\/p>\n
\nThe next year we brought in Dr. LaSalle Leffall, who was Chief of Surgery at Howard University School of Medicine. The next year, we brought in Dr. Clive Calendar, a well-known transplant surgeon from Howard University as well. And interestingly enough, what these professors also did, Dr. Jordan, Dr. LaSalle Leffall, as well as Dr. Calendar, they made rounds. They made grand rounds with the faculty at UNC as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, this was an opportunity for White faculty to see that we\u2019ve got a Harvard-trained hematologist. We\u2019ve got a transplant surgeon from Howard. We\u2019ve got a Chief of General Surgery from Howard. And guess what? They were already doing big things. And so, we want you to know that we\u2019re not so much newcomers on this front, but we have a history of people having achievements as well.<\/p>\n
\nOne other thing I gotta mention is my own uncle went to medical school in Switzerland.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh!<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: He is a physician who spent six years at the University of Zurich, and he took his medical training in German. So, very interesting guy; he just passed last year at the age of 93. But you\u2019re talking about an African American guy who finished medical school in about 1959 in Switzerland. He went over to Switzerland on a boat, I guess it was almost a tugboat, cargo boat kinda scenario, where he was living in some deep, dark hole or some place. See, there was another woman who was going over to study music in Zurich.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd then when he flew back six years later, he couldn\u2019t afford to come back to his own mother\u2019s funeral. But when he came back, the pilot on Swiss Air who learned that he had just finished medical school literally invited him to come and sit in the cockpit of the plane driving back because he was so just fascinated about this Black man who came from Hamlet, North Carolina to Zurich and just became a doctor. So, he literally sat in some kind of a jump seat in the cockpit talking back and forth with the pilot about this.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nHe had mentioned came back to New York, did his internship and residency at Harlem hospital, practiced in New York for many years. Retired at age 65, went to Sarasota, Florida. Began volunteering in the health department there doing General Internal Medicine. He was there on such a regular basis, 15 hours a week, that the Medical Director says, \u201cLook, why don\u2019t we pay you for doing this?\u201d He says, \u201cPay me?\u201d He says, \u201cYeah.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, from about age 67 to age 87, he worked 15 hours a week in the health department. He only retired at age 87.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Still sharp as a tack, a concert pianist, fluent in German. But he couldn\u2019t do the electronic medical records; they got to a point where they were doing a lot of that kind of stuff. He says, \u201cYou know what? I\u2019m just not able.\u201d So, that was the impetus for him to retire.<\/p>\n
\nBut in any event, to go back, when I went off to Boston was quite an experience. But there was also a lot of racism associated with that. I remember when I first got there, I couldn\u2019t find a place to live. Nobody would rent me an apartment. And eventually, I had to go through a rental agency who fronted for me as someone looking for an apartment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd I still remember when we were in these two people\u2019s office signing the paperwork, this lady walked in who actually owned the apartment and the lady said to her, \u201cHey, so and so. Dr. Mask just rented your apartment.\u201d And she looked at me and saw I was Black, she says, \u201cOh, no. That apartment is already rented.\u201d And she says, \u201cOh, no. That apartment is not rented. And Dr. Mask just completed the paperwork and he\u2019s your new tenant.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nBut you can imagine how disconcerting that was to me. We went to Boston and that was my first reception there.<\/p>\n
\nBut Mass General turned out to be a good experience. Or I remember I had one rotation that I got on, I was working with a guy by the name of Dr. Steven Crane, C-R-A-N-E, a well-known rheumatologist. And I had been doing the emergency room rotation before I started his rotation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, I was up all night and I came in the next day to start the rounds. And you\u2019re supposed to know everything about the patient, so when you get there \u2013 but I hadn\u2019t because I worked all night, it was an unusual situation. And so, he made rounds, and I didn\u2019t know anything about Patient A, I didn\u2019t know anything about Patient B. And he turned to me at the end of the walkthrough, and he says, \u201cAll I can say is that this was most unsatisfactory.\u201d That\u2019s what he said to me. And I was just \u2013 I felt that small.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Of course.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: But then, that was the impetus for me to get back and I worked double-time, triple-time and eventually I got Honors in that particular rotation. Because in your rotation you got either Pass or Honors, and he gave me Honors. But it was so \u2013 I was so taken aback by the fact that I wasn\u2019t prepared, but I had a reason for not being prepared. And so, it was good that I was able to turn that around.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nBut I remember situations when I first got there where the White nurses wouldn\u2019t take off my orders. I remember situations where I went out to my car once \u2013 and at Mass General, you wear white pants and a white coat and a white smock, and you have a little name tag that says, \u201cDr. Allen Mask.\u201d They also issued you a picture ID. But back then, nobody carried the picture ID.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, I walk in, and the security guard says, \u201cMay I help you?\u201d I says, \u201cWell, I\u2019m a doctor here.\u201d And I show my nametag on white, he says, \u201cThat\u2019s not good enough. Show me your picture ID.\u201d And I didn\u2019t have one and so, I say, \u201cWell, I tell you what. You don\u2019t let me back in here, but you gonna be responsible for the patients in the Baker Intensive Care Unit.\u201d And when I told him that, he says, \u201cOh listen, oh never mind. Go on in,\u201d that kind of thing.<\/p>\n
\nBut we ran into situations, oh, like that where there were just things that would happen that were disrespectful.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, anyway I was there for, I guess, four years. And then I came back to UNC \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: What was your residency in?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: It was in internal medicine.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Okay.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, it\u2019s internship in academic internal medicine, then I did two more years of internal medicine. And then I stayed on as a faculty member and there are different levels: there\u2019s the assistant in medicine, then there\u2019s instructor assistant professor, associate professor. I was at the first level, assistant. But it was an enjoyable experience. I got a chance to teach and to see patients, and I made a little bit of money doing that. I had access to the Harvard Faculty Club and it was a good experience.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nCame back to the second residency in anesthesiology at UNC. Then I was there for two years and I went to work for Burlington Anesthesia Associates after that. I was a general anesthesiologist then. That was an interesting experience, too, because that too was a very racist culture. It was back during the times of Jesse Helms; I remember walking in the locker room and seeing a lot of the Jesse Helms literature. But the interesting thing about the surgeons \u2013 they were all very nice to me, they would invite me to their house for dinner. They were big high school football fans; they would invite me to ee cummings High School for football games.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: The nurses would have my coffee ready for me when I would come in and during the day, they\u2019d figured out what you wanted for coffee and made your coffee for you. So, it was an interesting juxtaposition between being in such a rural, racist community but at the same time dealing with that kinda scenario where the people really wanna \u2013 were really, really quite nice, you know?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Huh, yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: This is my wife. This is my wife, Deirdre \u2013\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Hi. How are you doing?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Hi. How are you ma\u2019am?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Good, good.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: My name is Ra\u00fal Necochea. How are you?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Okay.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Welcome to our home.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Thank you. Thank you for having me.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. Deirdre\u2019s an OB-GYN.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh!<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. We met in \u2013 well, she trained in Boston City Hospital while I was at Mass General. She also has a Master\u2019s in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Did you go to the UNC School of Medicine by any chance?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: No.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: No.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Ah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Went to Meharry in Nashville.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh. Part of the reason why I\u2019m interviewing your husband is because the medical students from the UNC School of Medicine wanted to have some more of the history of medical students who were African Americans who came to UNC.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Well, you\u2019re speaking to the right one.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yes, I am.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah, yeah, he is.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Deirdre Mask: They sent you on to the right person.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nSo, anyway. So, we were there for a while, came back here and worked for them. I was doing a lot of moonlighting in Fayetteville as well, at Cape Fear Valley Hospital. And it\u2019s interesting, when I was working in the emergency room, I kept getting called up a lot to the intensive care unit there. Because they always wanted to get a line started, they always needed to have a patient intubated. And I was happy to do that, but then I discovered as well, I was being used because the people who owned the emergency room practice, they got paid every time I went up to do these very skilled procedures: intubations, arterial lines, Swan-Ganz catheters.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd it was hard, though, trying to be ER doc with a PA. PAs had just started back then. And then always getting called up to intubate a patient and do this kind of stuff. It\u2019s, \u201cWell, again.\u201d And, \u201cWhat am I doing here?\u201d And then I later realized that they were billing for all that stuff and that\u2019s why they did not encourage me to kinda cover two places at one time.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: So, they were billing \u2013 of course.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. But then eventually, the guys that ran the emergency room started the concept of urgent care centers.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: The concept of urgent care started first in Dallas in 1979. These guys in Dallas started their first urgent care center in 1982. And so, when I was working in the emergency room working in Burlington, I was also moonlighting a little bit in urgent care centers. And back then, we were very busy. The hospital looked down on us; they called us dock-in-the-boxes, but at the same time, we were seeing some many patients: 80, 100, 120 patients a day.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And they still kinda looked down on us when we talk about referring patients to them, they said, \u201cWho are you?\u201d And, \u201cWho are you referring to.\u201d And it wasn\u2019t until we opened [inaudible] [00:22:36] urgent care center in \u201985 where I practiced general internal medicine. But it\u2019s interesting, when we took our daughter to Harvard in 1998, she was in Apley Dorm in Harvard Square. And right across the street, I saw a sign in the building that said, \u201cHarvard Urgent Care\u201d. So, I said \u2013 that was in 1998, so I said, \u201cOh, we\u2019ve arrived.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nIt was soon thereafter that UNC and Duke began urgent care centers as well, but we had done it for 13 years before they would even get involved with them because, \u201cOh, we don\u2019t wanna do that. We don\u2019t understand that.\u201d But we were way, way ahead of our time with that.<\/p>\n
\nOf course, then I eventually opened the urgent care center. Then I began doing the medical reporting for WRAL TV in 1993. And I\u2019ve done that until now, and that was also a big part of my career as well. Kinda what Sanjay Gupta does at CNN, I\u2019ve done it for WRAL Television.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah. I googled up some of your clips online.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I saw –\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay, good. So, you\u2019ve had a chance to see some of that as well.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, anyway. So, I just jotted down some notes that I thought were important. There may be some typos or something here, but I just wanted to lay down some stuff on paper, and if there\u2019s other stuff you wanna talk about, then I\u2019m happy to continue.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I am delight \u2013 this is very helpful. I probably am \u2013 you\u2019re gonna think that I wasn\u2019t listening, but just get some of the important years \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: For the record. The years you went to UNC as an undergraduate were \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Undergraduate was from 1970 \u2013 1974. And let me set the stage: there were very, very few Black medical students on UNC\u2019s campus when I was here. I\u2019d venture to say that doing my four years here I probably never had another Black student in my class. Maybe once or twice, but rarely.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: During four years, I had three Black professors: one for an organic chemistry course, and he was my very last semester there; I had a Black professor in history; and I had one Black professor in psychology. So, there were three courses that I had African American professors as well. So, \u201970 to \u201974 for college, \u201974 to \u201978 for medical school; in Boston at Mass General from \u201978 until \u201982. And then, back to UNC for anesthesiology from \u201982 to \u201984. And then, Burlington Anesthesia Associates, Cape Fear Valley Hospital for a lot of emergency medicine. Some urgent care center.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd then I began practicing in Raleigh in 1985. Started the TV work in 1993, and the rest is history.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah. When you were \u2013 you mentioned a moment ago that when you were a very young man, you met an OB-GYN in the production room at the station.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Can you tell me a little bit about what is it that this doc did for you, or he showed for you, that made you really consider seriously medicine as a career?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Well, I was interested in television when I was at the television station, but then I realized something interesting. I realized I wanted to be a newsmaker and not a news reporter. In other words, I was going out telling everybody else\u2019s story but I wanted to have my own story.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd I did a series when I was there on the shortage of Black physicians in Mecklenburg county; we did a three-part series. That\u2019s how I went out and I met Dr. Les Walton, W-A-L-T-O-N. You should look up his biography because he left \u2013 he was one of the first GYN oncologists. Now, remember, up until about that time, the OB-GYNs took care of ovarian cancer, uterine cancer, etc. But then a subspecialty developed called GYN oncology. And he just was this Black man in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1972 when I was there, who comes into town. And he\u2019s the kingpin because nobody else \u2013 you don\u2019t really have any GYN oncologists in Charlotte.<\/p>\n
\nSo, I did a piece with him and I still remember amazing details. He took me to lunch as a part of us doing this story, and I just realized this guy was independent, he was smart.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nI\u2019d always been interested in medicine and background because of my uncle that I told you about. I said, \u201cHey, you know, I think I wanna do this.\u201d And I remember he said to me \u2013 I still remember the conversation, which shows you the impact you can have on people one-on-one. I asked him why he went into OB-GYN. He says, \u201cWell, because you\u2019re dealing with this \u2013 the female reproductive system. And I felt that I could master that. I felt that I could take books or whatever and I could learn everything I possibly need to know about that subject.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nI also remember wanting to impress him during this lunch we had. I was a young kid and I\u2019m interested in medicine. And I still remember this: I was trying to squeeze lemon into my iced tea and I squirted it into his eye. He was sitting real close.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yes.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And so, he did like this. And so, I say, \u201cWell, what am I gonnna do? I can\u2019t let him know that I gave up, I\u2019m a quitter.\u201d I said, \u201cI gotta get this lemon into my iced tea.\u201d So amazed, this 1972 and I think I remember this. So, I went to squeeze the lemon again and it squirted in his eye a second time.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Again? Wow.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I was like, \u201cOh. How stupid and how dumb you can be.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nBut anyway, so it ended up he was a great mentor. I may be able to find some of the \u2013 actually they printed out a promo for this three-part series I did. And I may be able to find that some place.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd interesting enough, let me go back and mention that I spent a semester at Duke studying Health Policy.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Under Dr. Harvey Estes, who started the whole concept of PAs \u2013 the whole concept of physicians\u2019 assistants started at Duke in 1966.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I took a course with Dr. Estes. There was a guy by the name of Dr. Richard Scheffler who was a Health Economist with UNC. He teamed up with Dr. Harvey Estes, who interestingly enough was a cardiologist and was also in charge of community medicine at Duke and they did this Health Policy course. It was like a 15-hour course. And they also flew in Dr. John A. D. Cooper, who was the head of the American Association of Medical Colleges from DC. It demonstrated to me how much money Duke had, because they would fly this guy in for this 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. seminar once a week.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Wow.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: It blew my mind. I said, \u201cYou mean you fly this guy down here Wednesday morning. He comes and lectures to us from 7:00 to 10:00, you put him up in a hotel, and he flies back the next day. How do you guys have that kind of influence? Who\u2019s paying for all of this?\u201d And that wasn\u2019t mine, but I never saw anybody flying in one day and staying one night and going back the next day. What they must have paid him to do that.<\/p>\n
\nBut anyway, also did a paper on the shortage of Black physicians in North Carolina, going back. I published that right before I started medical school in 1974. I\u2019ll have to get you a copy of that because it\u2019s a fascinating \u2013 you really wanna know about the history of medicine and who was doing what back then, that\u2019s a must-read.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I definitely do.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. That\u2019s a must-read.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I definitely do.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: This series that you\u2019re talking about on this paper, they sound like really, really important sources for what it is that the students really wanna know.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. Well, it\u2019s interesting because you gotta remember, you have to put this all in some perspective. Because we were in the very, very embryonic stages when I\u2019m talking about of getting UNC \u2013 there were 100 Black students on the, all of the campus at that time. When we would get together as a group to have parties, there were so few of us that we could get together and out of 100 people, you\u2019re talking about the graduate students and the serious students who were undergraduates who were upper-class undergraduate students studying all the time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, if we ever got together, it might be 12 or 15 of us or whatever. So, we\u2019d have a party in somebody\u2019s room, the dormitory room, and I remember the next year when more Black students came, we moved the party from somebody\u2019s room to the lounge. To the lounge of Hinton James or one of the south campus \u2013 Morris, one of south campus\u2019 dormitories. That\u2019s how few people there were.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd then when we started medical school, that really was a new experience for the Black students because we just had had so few students of color that started. And I don\u2019t know how many when the class before me who came in \u201973. I can think of just a couple of \u2013 a few students, I\u2019m sure that there was a few, but there weren\u2019t really a whole lot. I can\u2019t remember my meeting, yeah, yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Can you tell me a little bit about these students who were with you? Especially the other medical students who were also Black.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. They were just some of the most fascinating people you ever seen in your life. And Dr. Greg Drake, D-R-A-K-E, who went on \u2013 he was in service and getting his medical training at Walter Reed and went onto become a urologist. He just retired. Just a great guy from Fayetteville, North Carolina.<\/p>\n
\nAnother guy, Dr. John Regis, R-E-G-I-S, who started college with me on day 1. I can still remember our senior year trying to figure out who got into medical school. So, he would say to me, \u201cHey, Mask, you heard anything?\u201d And I\u2019d say, \u201cNo.\u201d And he\u2019d say \u2013 and I\u2019d say, \u201cHey Reg, you hear anything?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d And I still remember we got our acceptance letter in that January. Proud of us that we got accepted that January.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nThere\u2019s Dr. Lonnie Merrick, a guy I also that I went to college with and went to medical school with who went onto do his anesthesia residency at Stanford. When I went to Harvard, he went to Stanford. Just a great guy.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Gore, David Gore, who went to Virginia to do his surgery training.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Greg Crisp, who studied anesthesia and he practices in Burlington right now.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Gwen Todd, who trained in pediatrics. She\u2019s retired now, but she was in Raleigh. I think she spent most of her career down in Charleston, South Carolina.<\/p>\n
\nBut I want the record to show that we had a great time in medical school. People talk about it being arduous, going to other places where there was a lot of conflict and confusion and consternation and so forth. An environment was created there with Dean Chris Fordham, who was the Dean. And Dr. Marion Phillips, who was an associate Dean. Dr. Phillips is an African American. And a couple of White guys, Dr. Mitch Sorrow, S-O-R-R-O-W, and Dr. Huffines, H-U-F-F-I-N-E-S, Dr. Huffines and Dr. Sorrow, I believe they\u2019re passed on. Dr. Fordham has passed on as well.<\/p>\n
\nBut just some of the most fabulous people you ever wanna meet in your life. Dr. John Parker, who mentored me when I was doing my physical examination course in my second year. He had trained at Mass General. Just some wonderful people. And those \u2013 my four years of medical school were some of the best years of my life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd people talk a lot about racism and so forth, and so I can\u2019t ever remember a patient refusing to see me or in any way being disrespectful. That may have been an exception to the rule, and I don\u2019t remember that. Some of the White physicians who were faculty members were a bit condescending, but we countered that just with excellence. We used to be very participatory in our classrooms and in rounds and stuff. We made sure that we were over-prepared for that sort of thing.<\/p>\n
\nI can remember when I came back to do my second residency in anesthesia, there being some racism in the operating room. I know I was working with a White female, an otolaryngologist once and she was just convinced that something was wrong with the patient. She says, \u201cIs the patient okay?\u201d I said, \u201cYeah, the patient\u2019s fine.\u201d Nothing was wrong. She said, \u201cAre you sure it\u2019s fine?\u201d I said, \u201cYeah.\u201d She says, \u201cCall your attending.\u201d So, she called in Dr. Hunt, that was his name. And he came in and I say, \u201cShe wants to know is everything okay.\u201d So, he looked around and couldn\u2019t figure out \u2013 there were no bells going off, nothing. He says, \u201cNo, it\u2019s fine.\u201d And she said, \u201cWell, okay.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, you had to go through that kind of stuff with people. And there were some surgeons who weren\u2019t so nice, maybe, to work with. They weren\u2019t terribly courteous, they were curt, they might not even acknowledge your presence while you\u2019re in the room, etc., etc. So, it was some of those kinda things that went on, but it was nothing that I felt really, really bad about doing that experience.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nBut I think that out of all this, I hope that we\u2019re gonna come out with the need to recruit more minority medical faculty, to recruit more minority medical associates including administrators, nurses, secretaries, and etc. medical personnel.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nOne thing I did not like when I went over to Lineberger Cancer Institute as a medical reporter, they gave us access to the place before it officially opened; we got a chance to go with the cameras and tours. But I noticed when I walked around, I just didn\u2019t see enough Black people. I was looking at the secretaries, looking at the people running the wig shop, looking at the nurses, looking at the doctors.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd I said to myself, \u201cFor this place to have been financed to such a large degree, 85, 90 percent or more from state funds as opposed to donations \u2013 one of the few hospitals in the country whereby the state gave so much money to operate it, I was disappointed that we didn\u2019t have not only more Black doctors and so forth there, but as I looked around to the nurses and the administrators and people doing other jobs, I was disappointed about that as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nWe need to recruit more minority medical students, we need to create more interactions between current students and alumni, like myself, via conferences, banquets, and so forth. We need to strengthen the MED program. We need to create and maintain a welcoming environment for minority medical students. And we need to just continue to ask the question about how we can improve the experience for our students.<\/p>\n
\nAnd again, the demographics have changed. I remember when I was \u2013 I don\u2019t think we had any Asian students in our class, interestingly enough. I can remember American Indians, there being maybe one or two in our class. I remember maybe one or two Latino students, maybe, but not really that many as well. It\u2019s amazing how \u2013 now we saw minorities: East Indians and Hispanics in the laboratories doing PhDs and so, but thinking about in my medical school class \u2013 now, you gotta remember, there were only 110 in my class. Every class now may be up to 165 or so.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Currently?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Currently, I think there are 165 per class.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh, no. It\u2019s 190.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: 190?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Oh, god. So, it\u2019s way up. Yeah. Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: We\u2019re gonna grow again in a couple more years.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Well, when I was there, we\u2019re 110, all right? So, they weren\u2019t really a lot of us in there. I think that in terms of minorities, Black students \u2013 gosh out of that 110, maybe 16 or 18 may have been Black. And then there were one or two American Indian students, but in terms of East Indian students or Asian students, I just don\u2019t really remember any of my class to be perfectly honest with you. So \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Right now, I worked for a few years with admissions and as one of the people in the committee, last year we \u2013 our class was about 20 to 30 percent minority students.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Was it? Okay.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: But it\u2019s a large bag and African American students are still the largest minority.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Uh-huh.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: But Hispanics, like myself, are, I would say about the second-largest. No, no, they\u2019re not. Sorry. Asian students.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Right, uh-huh.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: South Asian students as well. Then maybe Hispanics. And yep, so it\u2019s a big bag \u2013 oh, also, students who are of African descent, very recent migrants.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Hm. Is that right? Interesting.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yes, from parts whose parents come from English-speaking parts of Africa, Nigeria and Ghana, for example. Lots more of those students in more recent classes.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And what about the composition of the MED program now? Do you know much about that? How large is it now? How many \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: It is still \u2013 it is not, as you said, for students who are already admitted. It\u2019s more of a pipeline for them that help students kind of run up to speed and then apply into medical school. I don\u2019t know how many students we have in MED right now. But yeah, it\u2019s definitely still going. There\u2019s \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Are they all minority students though?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: All of them.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay, good.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: No, no. I\u2019m lying. Because MED is also now attempting to recruit from under-represented rural areas in North Carolina.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay, okay. So, but there are no people in my position where we\u2019ve been admitted and now we get a chance to do MED. So, there are no students who come in, who let\u2019s say \u2013 if you start medical school in September, the summer before, you don\u2019t have any students that have already been admitted. Is that the idea?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: That\u2019s correct. There is a new program that started this year, and I\u2019m one of the faculty in it. It\u2019s called a MED EXCEL program, which consists of offering some under-represented racial and ethnic minority students pre-acceptance. So, as long as they complete this year-long course of preparation where they learn about patient skills, social and health system stuff, some of the medical organ system blocks. As long as they pass the year-long course, they will continue on and join the entering class.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, you\u2019re saying they\u2019ve already been admitted though, you mean some \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: It\u2019s like a pre-admittance.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Pre-admission.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Sort of thing.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: What\u2019s that program called?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: MED EXCEL.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: MED EXCEL.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: And it stands for something. Early experience in clinical education and learning.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, early –\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Experience.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Experience.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: In clinical.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: In clinical.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Education and learning.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And \u2013 I\u2019m sorry, early experience in clinical and \u2013<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Clinical education.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Clinical education, okay. And learning.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Correct.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Okay.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: And it is still part of \u2013 it\u2019s part of MED kind of a dialing out \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah, yeah. Because those kind of programs are really so important.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd there\u2019s some other stuff \u2013 when we were at Carolina, we used to always wonder why a lot of the White guys did better than us in organic chemistry and Chem 21. We just, we couldn\u2019t figure it out. And then we got into medical school, it became the great equalizer. And then we realized these guys used to talk about old tests that we didn\u2019t have access to. So, the Cassi Large on Cameron Avenue was known to be an academic return. And then it came out that they had years of very organized physics and chemistry and biochemistry old tests that they meticulously kept. And then it dawned on us that a lot of these professors were giving the same test every year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nWe never had access to any of that kind of stuff, which is why we couldn\u2019t understand how we made a 79, you made like a 98. We knew those guys weren\u2019t that much smarter than we were. But then, once we got to medical school and that process was erased, we found ourselves to be much more competitive, and in a lot of ways a lot better than these other students. Particularly with the help of the MED program.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: That\u2019s interesting.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, that was the great \u2013 and I think that\u2019s why we came in not with a lot of anxiety and trepidation, because we knew we could compete. And that was a big part of this whole comfort that I\u2019m talking about in enjoying ourselves and so forth is that we felt that we were welcome there, we felt that we were well-prepared. And so, that helped a lot.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: The other clarifying question that I had for you was: When you said that you did a bit of a rotation in Trinidad \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Right.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about that. I\u2019m especially curious about your possibility of meeting Afro-Caribbean people.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah, sure. Well, my uncle who practiced medicine in Brooklyn, Dr. George Mask, had a friend of his who was West Indian. And he met Dr. Dunsan McShawn, who was a surgeon in Trinidad. And my uncle told me about this guy, he says, \u201cI met this delightful guy who practices surgery in Trinidad, Port of Spain General Hospital in Trinidad.\u201d And so, I contacted him and said, \u201cI\u2019m an American medical student. I\u2019d love to come down and spend six weeks or so.\u201d So, the guy writes me back and he invites me not only to come to Trinidad, but to live with he and his wife.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Can you believe that?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: That\u2019s amazing.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: So, I land at the Port of Spain, Trinidad, West Indies. And it\u2019s \u2013 if you know about Trinidad, it\u2019s far. It was a long flight; it\u2019s not like flying to the Bahamas. It\u2019s three hours leaving from Miami. And so, I land and I get off the plane, and he was there to meet me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Whoa, you know? There. And so I live with him. I worked in his \u2013 the thing about it is, we started early in the morning. And it was almost like kind of chauvinistic kind of thing, but his wife would get up really early in the morning and prepare a formal breakfast for us.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: We\u2019d get up at 5:30, we\u2019d have breakfast at 6:00. Formal breakfast. And so, she\u2019d be up in her wardrobe and we\u2019d have breakfast. And it was a very formal breakfast; we had coffee and the whole thing. And so, we\u2019d eat, we\u2019d leave about 6:30, 6:45. And we\u2019d be gone all day. But his wife, quote-unquote \u201cdidn\u2019t work\u201d but she was happy, she had a housekeeper too. So, she wasn\u2019t there like scrubbing floors all day, but she was just free. And sort of the understanding was, \u201cYou go out and you work and you make the living. I\u2019m happy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, we\u2019d come home and there\u2019d be dinner.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah, whoa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I\u2019m like, \u201cWhoa. Dinner.\u201d And so, we\u2019d have a nice dinner. We went out every night. What do you mean we went out every night? His whole idea was, \u201cI\u2019m not working this hard and not doing something pleasurable.\u201d So, we\u2019d go to the Queen\u2019s Savannah for a horse race.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: We\u2019d go to the Carnival Bar at the Holiday Inn for drinks. His brother was a thoracic surgeon, we\u2019d go over to his house for drinks and for dinner or something. He had another brother who taught French at the University of West Indies, we\u2019d go visit with him. He had another brother who was Chief of the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: In Trinidad, we\u2019d go visit with him. He had a sister who was a banker, she ran one of the banks in Port of Spain. Just some of the most delightful people you ever met. And then I remember, I was there over the Fourth of July. The professor at the University of West Indies spoke French, he said, \u201cWe gonna go to the Ambassador to the U.S.\u2019s house for the Fourth of July.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I said, \u201cWhat do you mean? I\u2019m not invited to that.\u201d Just because he thought I\u2019m an American, when you in America during the Fourth of July celebration you are invited. I said, \u201cNo, and I\u2019m not invited.\u201d He said, \u201cYeah, we gonna go.\u201d I was so nervous when he says, \u201cWhen the guy opens the door, in your best American accent, say, \u2018Hey. Sorry, we\u2019re late.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd that\u2019s exactly what I said. I walked in and I say, \u201cHi. So sorry we\u2019re late.\u201d He said, \u201cOh, no. You\u2019re not late. Come in.\u201d And once we got through the door, of course he knew people. And we met people and we did stuff and so, once we got in, we blended and he knew people, he knew people. So, we were there. But it was all \u2013 we had no invitation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: That\u2019s \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And it was \u2013 you can imagine, these Ambassador\u2019s. The house was gorgeous.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: They had all this food \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Right.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And a pool in the back, and ah, man. I was just having a great time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nBut anyway, so to make a long story short, I met him through my uncle who was a physician. And we got there, we go to his office during the day and we\u2019d see general medical issue for general medical problems.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nI remember the surgeons at the hospital called \u201cMr.\u201d I guess in the English system you call them \u201cMr.\u201d rather than \u201cdoctor.\u201d And there was a guy there, and I still remember this, his name was \u2013 Mr. Butler was his name.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd we went into the operating room one time and he was doing a nephrectomy; he was removing a kidney. So, he kept pointing to all this stuff. I had no idea what he was talking about. It was early on in my rotation and man, I\u2019m in a fall. I\u2019m way in, what am I doing. He pointing to some little structure. He says, \u201cWhat is that?\u201d I say, \u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d And he pointing to something else, I get it wrong, and he said to me in front of everybody, he says, \u201cDr. Mask. Do they not teach anatomy in American medical schools?\u201d<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Ouch.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I was like, \u201cOuch.\u201d I was like, \u201cOh my god. What is this guy saying to me?\u201d You know? But he\u2019s \u2013 I\u2019m leaning over, trying to see something and blood\u2019s everywhere and he\u2019s pointing to something I can hardly see what he\u2019s talking about. But no, but he was a good guy. In fact, he gave me Honors in that rotation as well. So, that was a nice little blip, but it\u2019s funny. But you know, people tend to think that \u2013 one thing about the Caribbean medical students, too, they were better than we were at physical diagnosis.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Because they didn\u2019t have all the fancy machines. They didn\u2019t have the blood gas machines, and they didn\u2019t have all these scans and so forth that we so much depend on and make diagnoses. And so, the little subtleties that we\u2019ve learned in physical exam, they really use those things as opposed to us listening to somebody\u2019s chest and then trying to see what the chest x-ray shows, you know? So, I had great admiration for those students because they were \u2013 maybe they weren\u2019t as strong as us in the classroom, maybe so, I don\u2019t know. But in terms of clinical science, I thought they were all quite good.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Whoa.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Another quick clarification is: You said UNC was your first choice.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Right, mm-hmm.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Did you have the chance to go to any other, perhaps, and you said no?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. I had looked at St. Louis University, I\u2019d looked at Barnes in St. Louis, I\u2019d looked at Howard, I\u2019d looked at Meharry, which is where my wife went to medical school. And you may \u2013 it\u2019s one interesting tidbit I\u2019ll share with you: You may remember that when UNC, when UNC was not admitting Black students, the state subsidized Meharry Medical School to take Black students. You may know about that \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Being part of admissions. I think they still do that today. And so, I had considered going to medical school there, but who doesn\u2019t want to go to UNC? That was, when I got accepted there, there was really no consideration at all.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: It is a dream, yeah.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: But anything, yeah. So, my brother would have gone on there, but my brother got a Governor\u2019s scholarship and \u2013 they still do the Governor\u2019s scholarships now?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yes, they do.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah. So, he just looked at the value because UNC\u2019s tuition was so much less than Duke. He sorta looked at, \u201cGosh, this is more bang for my buck because they gonna pay all the expenses.\u201d And really, that\u2019s how he decided to go to Duke over UNC for medical school. So, that was how he did that.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Speaking of that, how did you finance as your medical education?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Excuse me?<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: How did you finance as your medical education?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: I financed it mostly through my parents because \u2013 I think back and it wasn\u2019t that expensive relative to what we pay now. I might have paid \u2013 it wasn\u2019t a lot of money back then – $600.00 a semester, maybe. Maybe less. Now back then, that was a lot more money, but I can remember \u2013 I also, I gave tours at the medical school.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Really?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Used to guys passed there doing that. When the students would come in to interview to go to medical school, they\u2019d have to have somebody to give them a tour of the school. And I still remember, I got $5.00 for doing that. And they would come in, and I\u2019d be free from lunch from 12:00 to 1:00, and I\u2019m come up to the admission\u2019s office, and I\u2019d escort the students around. So, we\u2019d go to Berryhill, and go to various places, and I learned how to walk backwards and so forth. I\u2019d make $5.00 for doing that.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd I remember my rent back then was $160.00 a month. It wasn\u2019t a lot. So, $5.00 a shot for that was good. And I didn\u2019t have any other job; it was my only job. But that and my parents, and I remember when I graduated. I can\u2019t remember any medical school that, quite honestly. I can\u2019t remember any medical school that \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: I have one last clarifying question about the timeline. You said that after your experience in Boston, you came back here for a fellowship in anesthesia.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Right.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Why come back here?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Oh, I just wanted to get back home.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Okay.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And I met \u2013 my mother had some surgery done by the same Dr. Walton about a year before I came back. And while I was in the recovery room with her, I met Dr. Su – Kenneth Sugioka. I don\u2019t know if you know the name or not. He was Chief of Anesthesia there. This is serendipity. I ran into him and I said to him, \u201cOh. You know I\u2019m interested in coming back here.\u201d When he heard I was at Mass General, he says, \u201cOh, well come on.\u201d I say, \u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d He says, \u201cYou gonna fill in an application, you got a spot.\u201d I said, \u201cReally?\u201d He says, \u201cYeah. You\u2019re at Mass General.\u201d I says, \u201cYeah.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nSo, literally, I called him and wrote him and that\u2019s who I got accepted. I never filled out a single application for that.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Huh.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: And then I came back and \u2013 but it gave me a chance to come back to North Carolina, which is where I wanted to be. Because I was out of Harvard Hospital and so many \u2013 the only way they would kick you out of there if you shot somebody. Once you\u2019ve got there, unless you were doing something crazy, you were there. And a lot of people just wanted to just stay there and just wanted to be a part of that. They didn\u2019t really pay a lot of money that you would think of. So, people were living way out in Arlington and other places and commuting in to get to the hospital. So, it wasn\u2019t like it was that much of a financial enumeration. And it was cold there. I remember the ice and the snow. I was just ready to come home.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nSo, in some ways I wish maybe I would have gone \u2013 I don\u2019t know, San Francisco, or go to New York, or done some other stuff, you know? Oh, I\u2019ve look at back at young people now and all the opportunities they have to take time off before they go to medical school or take time off here and there and join the Peace Corps and travel and so forth. My experience, other than Hamlet and Chapel Hill, was Boston and coming back. But this is such a delightful place to live. I don\u2019t have any regrets about that. No regrets at all.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: We\u2019re a little bit over the time that you said that you could give me. And I really appreciate that.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: No, we good, we good, oh I\u2019m fine. Let me cut a light on too so we can get a little more light in here.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Oh, yeah. Of course. Thank you.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Here\u2019s one of the last questions that I wanted to ask you, is I wanted to ask you: If there was a special moment when you felt you came into your own as a physician?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Mm-hmm. I\u2019ve been \u2013 several occasions like that, doing my training when I realized that I had the skills to take care of a patient, a sick patient on my own.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAfter all this undergraduate foundation, after all the basic sciences, the anatomy and the physiology and so forth. Then there\u2019s a steep learning curve as an intern. I can remember being an intern the first few weeks and having to hang blood for a patient. I remember I said to the nurse, I still remember her name, her name was Danny. \u201cHow am I gonna get this blood into that patient?\u201d Because there\u2019s a shirt and you gotta hang the blood, you gotta connect it to saline, you gotta do this and that kinda stuff.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nBut then I remember after learning how to do that, and I learned how to do a spinal tap. And I learned how to do a thoracentesis. And I learned how to do a proper pelvic and a rectal exam, and I knew what it sounded like for someone to have pneumonia, etc., etc.<\/p>\n
\nThen that was a moment of reckoning for me when I realized that I had really, really become a doctor. And then when I did my anesthesia training, what\u2019s interesting about training is that sometimes you don\u2019t learn hard, specific skills until you go into that particular specialty, but I wish medical students would focus more on becoming good at doing that part of their training because I realized when I was an internal medicine resident, I could intubate a patient but I was good at it, not great at it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd one thing I remember that stands out in my mind as an anesthesiologist being called to the operating room, being called up to the ICU to intubate a patient, we always knew how to prepare for a patient. So, we didn\u2019t just come in and start swinging. We\u2019d walk into the room and say, put a mask on, oxygenate the patient. We\u2019d raise the head of the bed to get it up so it was comfortable. We\u2019d make sure that we had suction so when we took a look at the vocal cords and there was mucus there, we could suck that out. And we visualized the cords, we got this \u2013 put a little pressure on the cricoid cartilage, and we\u2019d do it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd then it was like it all came together: the internal medicine training, and my anesthesia training, there was so much I could do.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd one of the messages that would be good to share with students is to tell them they need to learn very specific skills so even before they become interns because you can work to do that. You can go and \u2013 even if you don\u2019t do a rotation \u2013 go down to the operating room, identify yourself as a medical student, say, \u201cLook, I wanna come in and do half-dozen intubations.\u201d So, really learn how to do that right, you know?\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nYou can go and talk to the people in GI and say, \u201cHey, I don\u2019t really have to learn how to do a colonoscopy, but I might. Could I come in and actually do one under your supervision?\u201d So, you get that skill down.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd then you say, \u201cWell, gosh. Start an IV,\u201d so much now the blood drawing and IV starting is done by the technicians or the nurses. And so, you find yourself working someplace and you\u2019re a doctor but you really don\u2019t know how to start an IV, or you really don\u2019t know how to draw blood from a patient and in a complicated patient.<\/p>\n
\nSo, the message that I have for a lot of the medical students is while you\u2019re doing that training and so forth, make sure that you\u2019re not there just learning the theory and so forth. You gotta be able to do things.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nRemember Dr. Jim Brian, you may know him the past few years ago, I still remember what he said to me when I left to do my internship. He says, \u201cThree things you gotta be able to do because you\u2019ll be alone by yourself at night.\u201d I say, \u201cWhat are you talking about?\u201d He says, \u201cYeah. These are what you have to do.\u201d He says, \u201cYou gotta know how to read an EKG, you gotta know how to read a chest x-ray, and you gotta know how to treat an infection.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nHe told me that in 1978 before I went to Boston to do my internship. I still remember \u2013 \u201978, \u201988, \u201998, 2008, 2018, that was about 43 years ago. I still remember that those \u2013 that you gotta be able to read an EKG, you gotta be able to read a chest x-ray, you gotta be able to treat an infection. That\u2019s what you gotta do at 2:00 in the morning when you\u2019re by yourself.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nNow, of course, things have changed. They do a chest x-ray, the radiologist reads it and sends you a report in five minutes. And maybe with an EKG, you\u2019re in the hospital but you find some fellow that can help you to read it or whatever. And the infection, you call Infectious Disease and, \u201cI got so-and-so and so-and-so.\u201d But you\u2019re having to ask everybody to do everything. You gotta show somebody the EKG, \u201cCan you help me with that?\u201d You got the radiologist where you don\u2019t have to really look at the x-ray because somebody\u2019s gonna give you a report in the matter of a few minutes, \u201cWell, you have that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nEven at Mass General after hours, we didn\u2019t have a radiologist around to look at every film that we did. So, part of the process of mentoring students who are coming through is telling them the things that took us years to realize so that they can understand it right now. And that will simply enhance their education, enhance their ability to really take advantage of what\u2019s going on right now. Yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: The last thing I want to ask you, Dr. Mask, is: If you look back at all the work that you did, and especially at the part of your work that involves you becoming a trainee, of what are you proudest?<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Well, I\u2019m proud that I was able to get through the basic sciences of medical school and do well. I\u2019m proud that I was, in undergraduate school, able to master organic chemistry and physics and biology to be able to even get myself into medical school. I\u2019m glad that I persevered because there were a lot of hard hours back during the good old days.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nWe\u2019d go in at 6:00 in the morning and we\u2019d work all day and we\u2019d work all night, and we\u2019d work all in the middle of \u2013 work all night and then \u2013 I remember being in the Baker House at Mass General trying to write the last notes of my patients. And I\u2019m waiting for the new crew to come in. I know it\u2019s about 6:15, they\u2019ll be in \u2013 I remember hearing the cling, cling of the elevator as the new crew was coming onboard. Had to finish my note by the time I heard that cling, and then out.<\/p>\n
\nSo, I think there was just a sense of accomplishment to be able to get through each of the stages successfully. Because sometimes people just \u2013 they get fatigued, they\u2019re so close to the finish line but they wanna give up. And you just have to learn in this whole process to persevere.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd what the minority students are gonna find, too, is that there\u2019s still a lot of racism here. There was a lot of optimism when I was coming through, the Civil Rights\u2019 Movement. But then I think people were beginning to take a step back to say, \u201cWell, maybe things haven\u2019t been fair. Maybe we haven\u2019t been doing the right thing. Let\u2019s be progressive.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nOf course, you look at what we\u2019re going through right now, where people are saying, \u201cYeah. We\u2019re not being progressive and so what? That\u2019s who we are and how we are.\u201d And so, the students now are entering into an era that\u2019s a very challenging and very complicated era. And they\u2019ve gotta be able to persevere because you\u2019ve got not only the work itself which is hard: the academic work and the physical skills that you have to develop, but also you\u2019ve got a lot of obstacles. And unfortunately, people who don\u2019t wish you well. And you\u2019ve gotta be able to manage that as well, yeah.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Yeah. That\u2019s amazing. And that is all that I had to ask you.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Great.<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: And I really appreciate you.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Great. Well, thank you for that. It was a great idea and we\u2019d be happy to talk with any of these students. And it\u2019s interesting, for me it\u2019s a lot of fun to be able to tell people in 10 or 15 minutes what it took me 15 or 20 years to learn. You know, it really is.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd I think I mentioned to you during our early conversation where we had come and there were a bunch of us who had graduated years ago and there were medical students there who didn\u2019t seem to be terribly interested in speaking with us. And it was either you or somebody who said to me, \u201cWell, they really don\u2019t know what they don\u2019t know.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nAnd so, that\u2019s just the opposite of when I was in school because I was just anxious to talk to people and to figure out just any little tidbit of what you might do to make me more successful. And some of the kids, they\u2019ve finished Princeton and they come in and they doing this, and they doing that and they figure they know it all. And maybe they do, but they can always be helped by some advice and by some counsel and so forth that will make their lives a lot easier and a lot more enjoyable as well. So \u2013<\/p>\n
\nRa\u00fal: Thank you.<\/p>\n
\nDr. Mask: Oh, my pleasure. It\u2019s good to meet you.<\/p>\n
\n[End of Audio]\n
\nDuration: 64 minutes<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ra\u00fal: Record.\u00a0 And hello, this is Ra\u00fal Necochea from the Department of Social Medicine at the UNC School of Medicine. And today is December 13.\u00a0\u00a0 I\u2019m here with Dr. Allen Mask for the Black Alumni Experience project of the Office of Medical Education. Hello, Dr. Mask. Dr. Mask: Hello. Good afternoon. Ra\u00fal: The first question … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2386,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"acf-tax-class-year":[6],"class_list":["post-2318","alumni-interview","type-alumni-interview","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","acf-tax-class-year-6","odd"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/alumni-interview\/2318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/alumni-interview"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/alumni-interview"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"acf-tax-class-year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/md\/baep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/acf-tax-class-year?post=2318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}