By: Summer

Even If Implicit Bias Training Is A Good Idea, Mandating It Is Still Deeply Problematic.

The lawsuit was filed against the Medical Board of California in federal court this week.

Dr. Marilyn Singleton and Dr. Azadeh Khatibi are suing the California state medical board over an “implicit bias” training requirement.LinkedIn; Dr. Azadeh Khatibi/Twitter

Apair of doctors, one Black and the other an Iranian-American, are suing the Medical Board of California over a requirement mandating that continuing medical education courses include a focus on “implicit bias,” arguing the rule violates their freedom of speech and civil rights.

The Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit public interest legal organization, filed the complaint on behalf of Dr. Marilyn Singleton, an anesthesiologist, and Dr. Azadeh Khatibi, an ophthalmology specialist, in federal court on Tuesday, court filings show.

Do No Harm, an organization made up of medical professionals and policymakers that aims to protect health care from “a radical, divisive, and discriminatory ideology” is also a plaintiff.

The lawsuit is challenging a state mandate passed in 2019 that requires all continuing medical education courses involving direct patient care include implicit bias training, no matter who is teaching the course or what material is covered, according to the Pacific Legal Foundation.

All state-licensed physicians are required to complete 50 hours of continuing medical education every two years, the complaint notes.

The foundation describes implicit bias as the “idea that medical professionals unconsciously treat patients differently based on their race or other immutable characteristics.”

While the “law doesn’t say it, the accusation is clear: White people are oppressors and Black people are oppressed,” Singleton wrote in a Fox News opinion piece published Friday.

“Nationwide, implicit bias trainings for medical professionals routinely discuss systemic racism, white supremacy, and other race-based attacks on classes of people,” she added.

“I don’t care that I’m not the target,” Singleton added. “This still represents the kind of racist thinking that was starting to fade 50 years ago. I don’t want to be taught this evil, nor do I want to teach it to others.”

The plaintiffs contend in the suit that there is not enough evidence to prove implicit bias training is effective in reducing racial disparities in health care treatment. The concept is also considered controversial within the field, the filing argues.

For those reasons, the two doctors “do not want to be compelled to include discussion of implicit bias in the continuing medical education courses they teach,” states the court filing.

“Physicians have free will and act in the best interest of their patients,” Dr. Stanley Goldfarb, chairman of Do No Harm, said in a statement.

“The idea of unconscious bias states that one acts on those biases, and there’s no evidence of this happening in the medical community,” Goldfarb continued.

“Medical professionals take the Hippocratic oath to do no harm, and do not need lawmakers or medical organizations to tell them what they should think when providing medical advice to patients,” he noted

In her 50 years of medical practice, Singleton, who is Black, said she has not witnessed implicit bias in how her peers treat patients.

“The First Amendment protects me from being forced to teach the state’s preferred narrative on such a divisive topic,” she wrote in the piece for Fox News. “Medical professionals should teach medicine, not the party line.”

The lawsuit is seeking to bar the state from enforcing the requirement, along with “any further relief as the court may deem just, necessary or proper,” states the lawsuit.