Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story (15 page)

Today I try to emphasize this point when I speak to young people. “There isn't anybody in the world who isn't worth something,” I say. “If you're nice to them, they'll be nice to you. The same people you meet on the way up are the same kind of people you meet on the way down. Besides that, every person you meet is one of God's children.”

I truly believe that being a successful neurosurgeon doesn't mean I'm better than anybody else. It means that I'm fortunate because God gave me the talent to do this job well. I also believe that what talents I have I need to be willing to share with others.

CHAPTER 12

Coming Into My Own

T
he nurse looked at me with disinterest as I walked toward her station. “Yes?” she asked, pausing with a pencil in her hand. “Who did you come to pick up?” From the tone of her voice I immediately knew that she thought I was an orderly. I was wearing my green scrubs, nothing to indicate I was a doctor.

“I didn't come to pick up anyone.” I looked at her and smiled, realizing that the only Black people she had seen on the floor had been orderlies. Why should she think anything else? “I'm the new intern.”

“New intern? But you can't—I mean—I didn't mean to—” the nurse stuttered, trying to apologize without sounding prejudiced.

“That's OK,” I said, letting her off the hook. It was a natural mistake. “I'm new, so why should you know who I am?”

The first time I went into the Intensive Care Unit, I was wearing my whites (our monkey suits, as we interns called them), and a nurse signaled me. “You're here for Mr. Jordan?”

“No, ma'am, I'm not.”

“You sure?” she asked as a frown covered her forehead. “He's the only one who's scheduled for respiratory therapy today.”

By then I had come closer and she could read my name badge and the word
intern
under my name.

“Oh, I'm so very sorry,” she said, and I could tell she was.

Although I didn't say it, I would like to have told her, “It's all right because I realize most people do things based on their past experiences. You've never encountered a Black intern before, so you assumed I was the only kind of Black male you'd seen wearing whites, a respiratory therapist.” I smiled again and went on.

It was inevitable that a few White patients didn't want a Black doctor, and they protested to Dr. Long. One woman said, “I'm sorry, but I do not want a Black physician in on my case.”

Dr. Long had a standard answer, given in a calm but firm voice. “There's the door. You're welcome to walk through it. But if you stay here, Dr. Carson will handle your case.”

At the time people were making these objections, I didn't know about them. Only much later did Dr. Long tell me as he laughed about the prejudices of some patients. But there was no humor in his voice when he defined his position. He was adamant about his stance, allowing no prejudice because of color or ethnic background.

Of course, I knew how some individuals felt. I would have had to be pretty insensitive not to know. The way they behaved, their coldness, even without saying anything, made their feelings clear. Each time, however, I was able to remind myself they were individuals speaking for themselves and not representative of all Whites. No matter how strongly a patient felt, as soon as he voiced his objection he learned that Dr. Long would dismiss him on the spot if he said anything more. So far as I know, none of the patients ever left!

I honestly felt no great pressures. When I did encounter prejudice, I could hear Mother's voice in the back of my head saying things like, “Some people are ignorant and you have to educate them.”

The only pressure I felt during my internship, and in the years since, has been a self-imposed obligation to act as a role model for Black youngsters. These young folks need to know that the way to escape their often dismal situations is contained within themselves. They can't expect other people to do it for them. Perhaps I can't do much, but I can provide one living example of someone who made it and who came from what we now call a disadvantaged background. Basically I'm no different than many of them.

As I think of Black youth, I also want to say I believe that many of our pressing racial problems will be taken care of when we who are among the minorities will stand on our own feet and refuse to look to anybody else to save us from our situations. The culture in which we live stresses looking out for number one. Without adopting such a self-centered value system, we can demand the best of ourselves while we are extending our hands to help others.

I see glimmers of hope. For example, I noticed that when the Vietnamese came to the United States they often faced prejudice from everyone—White, Black, and Hispanics. But they didn't beg for handouts and often took the lowest jobs offered. Even well-educated individuals didn't mind sweeping floors if it was a paying job.

Today many of these same Vietnamese are property owners and entrepreneurs. That's the message I try to get across to the young people. The same opportunities are there, but we can't start out as vice president of the company. Even if we landed such a position, it wouldn't do us any good anyway because we wouldn't know how to do our work. It's better to start where we can fit in and then work our way up.

M
y story would be incomplete if I didn't add that during my year as an intern when I was in general surgery I had a conflict with one of the chief residents, a man from Georgia named Tommy. He couldn't seem to accept having a Black intern at Johns Hopkins. He never said anything to that effect, but he continually threw caustic remarks my way, cutting me short, ignoring me, sometimes being just plain rude.

On one occasion the underlying conflict came into the open when I asked, “Why do we have to draw blood from this patient? We still have—”

“Because I said so,” he thundered.

I did what he told me.

Several times that day when I asked questions, especially if they began with “Why,” he snapped back the same reply.

Late that afternoon something happened that had nothing to do with me, but he was angry and, I knew from experience, would stay that way for a long time. He spun toward me, beginning, as he often did with, “I'm a nice guy, but—” It hadn't taken me long to learn that those words contradicted his nice-guy image.

This time he really laid into me. “You really do think you're something because you've had an early acceptance into the neurosurgery department, don't you? Everybody is always talking about how good you are, but I don't think you're worth salt on the earth. As a matter of fact, I think you're lousy. And I want you to know, Carson, that I could get you kicked out of neurosurgery just like that.” He continued to rant for several minutes.

I just looked at him and didn't say a word. When he finally paused, I asked in my calmest voice, “Are you finished?”

“Yeah!”

“Fine,” I answered calmly.

That's all I said—all that was necessary—and he stopped ranting. He never did anything to me, and I wasn't concerned about his influence anyway. Although he was the chief resident, I knew that the chiefs of the departments were the ones who made the decisions. I was determined that I wasn't going to let him make me react because then he would be able to get to me. Instead I did my duties as I saw fit. Nobody else ever voiced any complaints about me, so I wasn't overly concerned about what he had to say.

In the general surgery department, I encountered several men who acted like the pompous, stereotyped surgeons. It bothered me and I wanted out of that whole thing. When I moved to neurosurgery it wasn't like that. Dr. Donlin Long, who has chaired the neurosurgery department at Hopkins since 1973, is the nicest guy in the world. If anybody has earned the right to be pompous, it should be him because he knows everything and everybody, and technically he is one of the best (if not the best) in the world. Yet he always has time for people and treats everyone nicely. Since the beginning, even when I was a lowly intern, I've always found him ready to answer my questions.

He is about an inch under six feet and of average build. At the time I began my internship he had salt-and-pepper hair, heavy on the pepper. Now his hair is mostly salt. He speaks with a deep voice, and people here at Hopkins are always imitating him. He knows they do it and laughs about it himself because he's got a great sense of humor. This is the man who became my mentor.

I've admired him since the first time we met. For one thing, when I came to Hopkins in 1977 there were few Blacks and none on the full-time faculty. One of the chief residents in cardiac surgery was Black, Levi Watkins, and I was one of two Black interns in general surgery, the other being Martin Goines, who had also gone to Yale.
*

Many do their internship in general surgery but fewer in neurosurgery. Some years nobody from the Hopkins' general surgery programs division goes into neurosurgery. At the end of my intern year, five out of our group of 30 showed interest in going into neurosurgery. Of course, there were also the 125 people from other places around the country who wanted one of those slots. That year Hopkins had only one open slot.

A
fter my year of internship I faced six years of residency, one more year of general surgery, and five of neurosurgery. I was supposed to do two years of general surgery because I applied for neurosurgery, but I didn't want to do it. I didn't like general surgery and I wanted to get out. I disliked general surgery so much I was willing to sacrifice trying for a position in the neurosurgery department at Hopkins and go somewhere else if they would take me after only one year.

I had gotten an extremely good recommendation through all my rotations as an intern. I was finishing my month rotation as an intern on the neurosurgery service and was reaching the point of writing to other schools.

However, Dr. Long called me into his office. “Ben,” he said, “you've done an extremely fine job as an intern.”

“Thank you,” I answered, pleased to hear those words.

“Well, Ben, we've noted that you've done extremely well on your rotation on the service. All of the attendings [i.e., surgeons] have been quite impressed with your work.”

Despite the fact that I wanted my features to remain passive, I know I must have been grinning widely.

“It's like this,” he said and leaned slightly forward. “We'd be interested in having you join our neurosurgery program next year rather than your doing an additional year's work in general surgery.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling my words were so inadequate.

His offer was a definite answer to my prayers.

I
was a resident at Johns Hopkins from 1978 through 1982. In 1981 I was a senior resident at Baltimore City Hospital (now Francis Scott Key Medical Center), owned by Johns Hopkins.

In one memorable instance at Baltimore City, paramedics brought in a patient who had been severely beaten on the head with a baseball bat. This beating took place during the time of a meeting of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons in Boston. Most of the faculty was away at the meeting, including the faculty person who was covering at Baltimore City Hospital. The faculty member on duty at Johns Hopkins was supposed to be covering all the hospitals.