The Weight of the White Coat: Latinos Navigating American Medicine

Glenda M. Flores

University of California Press, 2025 - Medical - 310 pages

"Few people know much about Latina/o physicians as students, people, or workers in a high-skill occupation in the United States. The Weight of the White Coat traces the life stages that Latina/o physicians follow and the mechanisms that disadvantage or advantage them throughout their careers, from the family to the practice of medicine. Glenda M. Flores turns a careful, considered eye to this pan-ethnic group with heterogeneous characteristics in an elite profession, observing how demographic characteristics such as gender and ethnicity act like cumulative weights in their coat pockets, producing hindrances for some-thus limiting their advancement-and elevating others as they provide care in poor and wealthy communities. Here, the status of Latina/o doctors provides a unique lens for examining the polyvalent weight of physicianhood within the heterogeneous and still unsettled contours of Latinidad."--

About the author

Glenda M. Flores is Associate Professor of Chicano/Latino Studies at the University of California, Irvine. She is the author of Latina Teachers: Creating Careers and Guarding Culture.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Weight of the White Coat: Latinos Navigating American Medicine
• Author: Glenda M. Flores
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: University of California Press, 2025
• ISBN: 0520409213, 9780520409217
• Length: 310 pages
• Subjects: Medical / General; Medical / Health Care Delivery; Medical / History; Social Science / Cultural & Ethnic Studies / American / Hispanic & Latino Studies; Social Science / Sociology / General