Are arabs (muslims or christians) underrepresented in medicine?

[qatralnada]

Hey;
I am a first generation Arab came to the US after high school. I am applying this cycle and I would like to know if I should list myself as underrepresented or not? thanks

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[Medstart108]

Hey;
I am a first generation Arab came to the US after high school. I am applying this cycle and I would like to know if I should list myself as underrepresented or not? thanks

I don't believe so. Arab doctors are more or less overrepresented in the U.S health care system. A good test of how to determine if you are over or under represented that colleges use is compare the % of doctors from that ethnicity to the % of the general population. I know a lot of arab students interested in medicine, I don't think you are underrepresented. Generally, students that are considered underrepresented are from black, latino or native american backgrounds. At least in the U.S

 

[CpGisland]

No. Anyone from north Africa or the middle east is supposed to put down Caucasian, which is not an underrepresented group

 

[TriagePreMed]

Agreed. Not URM at all.

 

[DrMidlife]

There's some subjectivity in the determination of URM, and some objectivity.

The objectivity comes from looking at how many of X there are in the general population, vs. how many X practicing physicians there are.

The US Census doesn't count Arabs (as a poster noted above). But you can figure out the numbers elsewhere. Arabs are about 1% of the US population (http://www.prejudiceinstitute.org/Factsheets5-ArabAmericans.html) and are about 1.5% of practicing physicians (http://www.naama.com/naama-arab-american-physicians.php). These numbers could be off by a lot and it still looks like Arabs are not UR (underrepresented).

Comparative numbers compiled from wikipedia and from the AMA (precision in these numbers is completely inappropriate as they cross years and sources, but you get the idea):
Whites in the US population: 72.4%
White physicians: 54.5%
Blacks in the US population: 12.6%
Black physicians: 3.5%
Asians in the US population: 4.8%
Asian physicians: 12.2%
Hispanics in the US population: 16.3%
Hispanic physicians: 4.9%

So it's pretty easy to see that Asians, which are M, are not UR, and that Blacks and Hispanics are UR as well as M.

Best of luck to you.

 

[qatralnada]

Thanks a lot for the input!🙂

 

[New Vocab]

No. Anyone from north Africa or the middle east is supposed to put down Caucasian, which is not an underrepresented group

What? So you're saying North Africans are supposed to say they are white? This is not true though?

First, Arab genetics are different to whites, meaning they form a cluster apart from Europeans (thus meaning they are not white).

Second, some Arabs have black African admixture (at least those in places like Saudi Arabia and Yemen the average person has 10% Sub Saharan; this is probably not the case in places like Iraq or Iran).
This should be enough to separate the North Africans at least.

 

[TriagePreMed]

What? So you're saying North Africans are supposed to say they are white? This is not true though?

First, Arab genetics are different to whites, meaning they form a cluster apart from Europeans (thus meaning they are not white).

Second, some Arabs have black African admixture (at least those in places like Saudi Arabia and Yemen the average person has 10% Sub Saharan; this is probably not the case in places like Iraq or Iran).
This should be enough to separate the North Africans at least.

Unfortunately, this is not how it works for the admissions process. Arabic people and North African are considered white, whether fair or not.

 

[MT Headed]

Second, some Arabs have black African admixture (at least those in places like Saudi Arabia and Yemen the average person has 10% Sub Saharan; this is probably not the case in places like Iraq or Iran).

When somebody accuses an Iranian of being an Arab, they generally wind up with a black eye admixture.

 

[Apollyon]

When somebody accuses an Iranian of being an Arab, they generally wind up with a black eye admixture.

I literally LOLed. However, I think that it is homogenous, instead of being an admixture.

 

[AshPreMed]

What are you basing your claim off of? First of all, Arabs are not many in medicine (even in proportion to their populations). Also, in case you are mixing up Arabs and Asian Indians (like majority of people do), know that they have had very different cultures, languages, skin color, and live reasonably far apart (Middle vs Southeast Asia). In other words, they are races that are as different as Caucasians compared with Africans. I believe Arabs are underrepresented in medicine. Having only Africans or South Americans qualify does not seem reasonable as there are many underrepresented ethnic groups in the world that happen to be from other continents. Arabs are also being eradicated in large numbers these days and obviously many have poor education systems (many, not all) due to the costs of war and corruption in some countries (I've lived in some)... They're not abundant in practicing medicine...

 

[NWS]

Hmm I'm Afghan (parents born in Pakistan), I should have used the urm angle when I was applying to med school back in the day.

Sent from my GT-N7000

 

[LaughingMan]

Yeah---echoing what other posters have said. Arabs are not URM.

 

[AshPreMed]

Once again, provide evidence to support your claim.

 

[JRmed]

Once again, provide evidence to support your claim.

Look it doesn't matter what anyone says, when you apply you simple pick out of the options available.. and the simple fact is THERE IS NO URM button.. the schools will decide what they consider you, but as someone already showed the current number of Arab doctors in the field vs the number in the country show that they are not UR

 

[bad virus]

What? So you're saying North Africans are supposed to say they are white? This is not true though?

First, Arab genetics are different to whites, meaning they form a cluster apart from Europeans (thus meaning they are not white).

Second, some Arabs have black African admixture (at least those in places like Saudi Arabia and Yemen the average person has 10% Sub Saharan; this is probably not the case in places like Iraq or Iran).
This should be enough to separate the North Africans at least.

So, here it is. I am a first gen Ayrab, born in the USA but still ESL. Officially, we are supposed to put caucasian on us govt forms. It always says caucasian (middle eastern decent). Although, no one will fault you if you put other. It won't hurt or help you. Given you are first gen, you might be economically disadvantaged.

Anyway, compared to the population of ayrabs in the states, we are over represented in health care. Same with the jews. Small populations with many doctors.

good luck on your app btw.

 

[AshPreMed]

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