Who is Katherine Scafide? Angelina Jolie pens powerful op-ed about 'racial bias' against domestic violence survivors in health care
VIRGINIA, UNITED STATES: Actress and activist Angelina Jolie has voiced her concerns about racial disparities in the field of medical care. In an op-ed published in the American Journal of Nursing, the 48-year-old Jolie discussed a breakthrough technology that enables the detection of bruising on darker skin tones.
Drawing from her advocacy against domestic violence, she described her visit to forensic nurse Katherine N Scafide, who demonstrated a portable device that uses "alternate light" to reveal bruising on the skin. Scafide’s extensive experience in caring for living and deceased victims of violence, her practice has significantly contributed to her research endeavors. Who is the nurse who employs innovation to identify violent injuries?
Katherine Scafide’s various service roles
Katherine "Kat" Scafide, according to her biography, is an esteemed forensic nurse, scientist, and tenured Associate Professor in the School of Nursing. With extensive experience in caring for living and deceased victims of violence, her practice has significantly contributed to her research endeavors.
Dr Scafide's primary research focus revolves around promoting equity in the medical identification and forensic documentation of injuries, with a particular emphasis on patients of color. She employs innovative technology to advance these efforts and has received multiple federal awards in support of her work.
Currently, Dr Scafide is involved in developing and evaluating clinical guidelines for implementing this technology into forensic nursing practice. Her interdisciplinary research teams include collaborations with the CPH Health Informatics and Volgenau School of Engineering at George Mason University. Together, they aim to explore the potential use of deep learning techniques for modeling bruise age from digital images and establish a national repository for bruise images.
Protecting abuse survivors
Through her op-ed, Jolie aims to shed light on the importance of developing medical practices that consider and address racial disparities in diagnosis and treatment. While discussing the new bruise-detecting technology, Angelina Jolie emphasized that it represents just one component of a larger framework. However, she recognized its significance as a crucial step in safeguarding survivors of abuse. By improving the identification and documentation of injuries, especially among victims of domestic violence, this technology contributes to the overall mission of providing protection and support to those who have experienced abuse.
Jolie also shared personal insights into her own family's experiences, noting instances where her children of color were misdiagnosed due to their skin tone. Towards the end of her op-ed, she recounted a medical procedure her 18-year-old daughter Zahara, who hails from Ethiopia, underwent. Zahara was advised to look for signs of pink around her incision sites to ensure proper healing. “I had a talk with my daughter, both of us knowing that we would have to look for signs of infection based on our own knowledge, not what the nurse had said, despite her undoubted good intentions,” the filmmaker penned.
'For abuse victims, evidence of injury is often crucial'
The actress wrote in the op-ed, “For abuse victims, evidence of injury is often crucial for accessing legal protection and physical and mental health treatment, making the role of health care professionals critical.” She went on to say, “Without use of the best available technology to detect bruising, abuse survivors of color are at a significant disadvantage in having their injuries properly identified and documented, are at greater risk for further abuse, and have less of a chance of receiving justice or medical care.”
Jolie stated that this new bruise detection technology is only one part of a larger whole, but an important step in protecting victims of abuse. "Let's be clear, racial bias in forensic evidence collection is only one aspect of much larger societal issues that lead to health care inequities and racially biased health outcomes," she noted. "Many factors contribute to the unacceptable, disproportionate impact of domestic violence on communities of color in America, and all must be addressed."