Rachel Pearson

Bio: Rachel Pearson is a physician and researcher who holds an MD and a PhD from the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas. Her writing has appeared in Scientific American, The Guardian, and the Texas Observer. She is currently a resident at Seattle Children’s Hospital. She is the author of No Apparent Distress.

 

A brutally frank memoir about doctors and patients in a health care system that puts the poor at risk.

 

In medical charts, the term “N.A.D.” (No Apparent Distress) is used for patients who appear stable. The phrase also aptly describes America’s medical system when it comes to treating the underprivileged. Medical students learn on the bodies of the poor—and the poor suffer from their mistakes.

 

Rachel Pearson confronted these harsh realities when she started medical school in Galveston, Texas. Pearson, herself from a working-class background, remains haunted by the suicide of a close friend, experiences firsthand the heartbreak of her own errors in a patient’s care, and witnesses the ruinous effects of a hurricane on a Texas town’s medical system. In a free clinic where the motto is “All Are Welcome Here,” she learns how to practice medicine with love and tenacity amidst the raging injustices of a system that favors the rich and the white. No Apparent Distress is at once an indictment of American health care and a deeply moving tale of one doctor’s coming-of-age.

 

For more about Rachel and her works, go to https://www.scientificamerican.com/author/rachel-pearson/

---