nelson l. adams III, m.d. - new era in black medicine
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photo by steed media service
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President, National Medical Association
Dr. Nelson Adams’ reign as the 108th president of the National Medical Association (NMA) commenced about a decade after he vanquished a personal addiction so powerful, it has been compared to illicit substances in terms of the difficulty to permanently repel its sinister allure. And some testify it’s even harder.
“It’s a very significant day for me. Eleven years ago, I quit smoking. Yes … me, a doctor,” says Dr. Adams, who’s also a practicing obstetrician-gynecologist from Miami. “And I was someone who knew better, someone whose father was a smoker and died from a smoking-related illness. Even when I was smoking, I would tell my patients not to smoke. I can now proudly say that I quit.”
Dr. Adams, who was in Honolulu for the NMA’s 2007 Annual Convention and Scientific Assembly, is using this personal resolve as currency to implement a series of bold initiatives and goals which include: increasing health literacy among African Americans; advocating disease prevention; eradicating health care disparities; and increasing the number of African American physicians. Even though Dr. Adams says unequivocally that “the responsibility for your health lies with you,” the objective of the 30,000-member organization, which was founded in 1895, is to close the chasm in inequitable treatment and to provide black patients more of their own to identify with.
“It’s been well established that the outcome of your problem or disease is related to the commonness between the patient and the doctor. To that end, we’ve got to do something about increasing health care providers,” says Dr. Adams. –terry shropshire
For more information about the NMA, log onto www.nmanet.org.
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