Dr. Raúl Necochea
Department of Social Medicine
Faculty Profile
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Interview Transcript
Raúl: Ten seconds. Welcome Dr. Ken Banks. My name is Raúl Necochea López. I am from the Department of Social Medicine at the . The day is February the twenty-third — twenty-second, February, 22, 2022 and I’m doing an interview for the Black Alumni Experience at the . Welcome Dr. Banks.
Dr. Banks: Thank you sir. Glad to be here with you.
Raúl: It’s a pleasure to have you with us. To begin, would you please tell us about your place and date of birth?
Dr. Banks: Yes, I was born July 28, 1947 in the — well, a town called Edenton. Actually, it was out in the woods section, like a subcommunity of Edenton called Herftord Road Community. Dirt lane, wooden house. First nine years of my life just my mother, father, her parents, her sister, and we kind of were like sharecroppers and lived in a wooden house, no indoor plumbing, no electricity, no TV, no telephone. We did have a battery powered radio. That was great. Heat and cooking was through a wood stove, that kind of stuff. And then, that’s the first nine years of my life. Then, of course, latter half, three brothers and one sister came along. But we – we did okay. The house, roof leaked when it
rained and there was always a problem with snakes — snakes coming in the house and mosquitos and stuff like that, but we did fine. We did fine.Raúl: And at nine years old, did you move some place close or far?
Dr. Banks: No. We stayed — we stayed in that house for years. As a matter of fact, we were still in that house when I was — went off to college.
Raúl: Oh, okay.
Dr. Banks: It wasn’t until later that we got a house. My mother and we kind of — she did the majority of it, but kind of got a house later. She got her house. I think I was here in med school when they finally got a house with some indoor plumbing and that kind of stuff. Yeah, I think I bought my parents their first TV.
Raúl: Oh, wow.
Dr. Banks: I was a resident when I did that, but yeah.
Raúl: That’s amazing. When you were younger, who would you say were the most influential folks you had?
Dr. Banks: When I was young? And, when you say young, you mean under a teenager or –
Raúl: Under a teenager.
Dr. Banks: Okay. Well, I’d say — well my whole life really, but young – my mother. I’d put her number one because she believed in hard work, but honest work. Keeping your word. Doing what you’re assigned to do, what you’re told to do. And, to have a vision of what you want and how to get what you want and not settle for what we had. Always talking about that. And she believed in education. She strongly — she, I can give you some examples of that but –
Raúl: Yes, please.
Dr. Banks: But, when — when we had projects to do that required work. Books that we didn’t have. My mother, and we couldn’t use the library and my little school didn’t have a real library, but my mother went out and got us a set of encyclopedias.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: Got me a set of encyclopedias so I could do work, projects, and things like that. My mother, while I was still in, I think it was high — yeah, high school. Went out and she went back to school herself. She went to Elizabeth City State University and got her degree in teaching and graduated the valedictorian of her class. Not only did she do that, but when I was here at Carolina, she and her sister went to Columbia and got their master’s degree. Not only that, but my mother was voted Teacher of the Year in the state of North Carolina twice before she got sick and had to, you know, stop. But she talked about education all the time. And even when I was little, and we didn’t have TV and all that stuff.
You know, how she used to, at night to get our minds — she used to tell us stories. Something you never heard of, but Brer Rabbit, Peter Rabbit, all that kind of stuff and she would do the voices. All that stuff. She would tell us about strong people in the Bible. Faith and what that could do and what that could move. And never give up. The faith in the Bible. What — so, she was like that all her life. All her children. And the other thing that she did, and we didn’t know this until she had passed, but she told each and every one — when I got ready to leave home to come to school and stuff she said, “don’t ever forget your family. You take care of your brothers and sister. Take care of your family. I want you to promise me that.” I said, “of course, I will.” And, she said, “don’t say anything about it”, but she told each one of us the exact same thing when they got ready to leave. She told my next older brother, other brother, next brother, my sister. Same thing. We were — we were all relayed that. That’s how she was.
My grandfather, a super strong man who also believed in work and believed in, again, if you say you’re going to do something, you have to do it. If you take a – and he always used to say when we was working on this farm for somebody else. He said, “if you take a job, you do the job. You do it. No matter what it takes, you do the job.” And he embarrassed the heck out of me the first time I was out in the field chopping peanuts. And it was so tough, I was skipping things. The man who owned the — he didn’t — the man who owned the farm didn’t have to be out there. My granddad certainly was not his foreman, but he saw what I had done. He came down there and took me back over that rope. He said, “don’t ever do this again”. And I didn’t. We worked in tobacco. Snakes were in the barn. And I announced to my grandfather that, “I ain’t going back in there”. And he told me, “we’re hired to do a job, we’re gonna do it”. But he was like that with everything. And the one big thing he always used to tell us he said, “listen, whatever you do in life, get some education and be your own boss.” He always emphasized that.
Other people, my father, course, he was a hard worker and he taught me about working and doing things with your hands. I would say outside of that — my house, schoolteacher Mrs. Reeves, she was — she taught me through from fifth grade to the eighth grade. And she also, like my mother, screamed education, learning things and she started teaching us, the whole class, things that really weren’t even on the curriculum. Like, phonetics, phonics. Nobody was teaching that, but her. But she taught it to her class because it was not approved by the school and I couldn’t understand years later why it wasn’t. I think every kid should know how to do it. I taught it to my kids. You can break down a word. You can diagram a sentence. You can do a whole lot of stuff. Words you never thought you could pronounce if you do phonics — you know what phonics — you know about phonics?
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: Oh, okay. I thought that was great, so those people kept pushing. That’s in my younger life.
Raúl: You were the older.
Dr. Banks: I was the oldest.
Raúl: Where did you go to school? In Edenton?
Dr. Banks: You mean high school?
Raúl: Yeah, high school.
Dr. Banks: Oh, yeah. There were two schools. Well, two schools. The Black school which was called D.F. Walker High School. I spent all my time there from first grade on up to graduation. And there was John A. Holmes school, that was the White school. They had all the grades also. It was my senior year that they decided to integrate the schools, but — and — and a lot of people teachers wanted me and a few others to go over there to well, demonstrate that all of us aren’t as dumb as like they said we are. I didn’t want to go and I didn’t go, but some of the people did go and we saw some of the books that we were using. And you hear this on the news all the time, but we saw books that we were using, which are torn, scratched up, all that. And some of the books they were using. Brand new and all that. But either way you have to find a way to make it. But that’s — but I went to an all-Black school.
Raúl: When you were younger did you know many physicians?
Dr. Banks: No. Not many, no. As a matter of fact, I was born at the house. Doctor — we had a doctor, he was an older Black gentleman named Dr. Holly. He delivered me at the house. Never went to the hospital and I don’t think I saw him again until I got ready to get my physical to come to — to go to college. Now, we did have a county nurse who would give us the appropriate shots at the appropriate time. We had a health department, and I did see a dentist once a year. Dr. Horton, and he graduated from dental school here also. And Dr. Holly, his — his — he was overworked because he would take care of all the Black people, but he was not allowed to practice inside the hospital. He could not admit patients
and any black patient was sick that would go there, there was a special section just for Black patients away from all of their normal patients. So, and you know, he — my mother saw more than I did, but he would talk to her about that kind of stuff. In everyday life you can swallow it, but — and I didn’t know until I found out I was born at the house, and I said, “how come you didn’t have me at the hospital?” And they said, “cause we couldn’t go.”Raúl: Right. And all of her four births of your — all your siblings were born in the house also?
Dr. Banks: No — no. Finally, they were born, my — the rest of them were born at the hospital, outpatient section.
Raúl: When you were in high school, is that when you started thinking about medicine or about –
Dr. Banks: Okay. No, not medicine per se, but the biological sciences and science courses I just — and history. I loved the history. I loved the science courses. I was just drawn to them for some reason, and I was getting presents like, for Christmas I was getting telescopes to look up in the sky. My mother would get — that’s what I wanted. But I did, let’s see, now when I got my — I had two talks with Dr. Holly. The one talk was when I became a teenager and my folks wanted me to go to see him to have the sex talk. We didn’t have a sex talk. Know what? I went to his office. He sat here, I sat there. He said — and he looked at me and he said, “you know what’s going on don’t you?” I never forget that, and I said,
“I guess so”. That was the visit.The next time I came — I’m telling you the truth. That’s the truth. The next time was when I got my exam to go to college and he was saying, “you know what you’re gonna do?” And I said, “No. I really wanted to go in the Air Force or something like that, but my folks really want me to try college for at least a year.” That was the deal. If I didn’t like it after a year, then they wouldn’t object to me trying to get into the Air Force or something like that. Definitely didn’t want me staying around doing farm work and stuff and I didn’t want to do that either. But, so, it wasn’t in high school, but it was in high school that he mentioned, “you know we could always use more doctors around here”. He said, “who knows, maybe you can practice in a hospital one day”. Dr. Slade was able to do that. So, it wasn’t until I actually got into Livingstone that I found myself really thinking more about medicine and that was because of — well, that was because of again, some great teachers and going to college was this third best learning experience of my life.
Raúl: Third best?
Dr. Banks: Third best.
Raúl: After?
Dr. Banks: Well, I’ll — okay, all right. Third best was going to college and I have reasons for that, see? Second best was coming here. The first best. No, that’s the fourth. The next — the very best learning experience I’ve had. I had to put them together. There is my residency training and then actually going out and practicing, but — and I’ll tell you, in this day when you finish med school you can go get a license. I would recommend going to do a residency program before anybody says I’m going to go start practicing medicine because I learned so much. And that was — residencies were hard. It was every other day, every other night and you were getting killed. And I’m getting way ahead of the program, but — but anyway, I’ll come back to that.
But high school — went to Livingstone. The reason I chose Livingstone. I know that is one of your questions was that for one thing, they gave me a scholarship. That’s one thing. But I didn’t have any other thoughts of where I wanted to go to college and my two senior advisors at high school both went to Livingstone and they had — they seemed to be the sharpest teachers at the place. Had most of the respect. And they kept pushing. They pushed a few of us to try Livingstone. I said, “okay”. And they got about five recruits out of my senior class to go to Livingstone and two of them were guys that were my closest friends growing up. So, went
to Livingstone and then, I gotta tell you. I got to Livingstone. I had
a roof over my head. I had showers.Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: I had running water. No, no, really, you’re laughing and when I tell people this and they saw my reaction when I first got my home. See, a cafeteria right across the campus. All I got to do is show a passbook and I can eat three times a day.
Raúl: Oh, my God.
Dr. Banks: I was like, “what the heck”. And when people were complaining. I, and well, I quickly learned to shut up about what I was happy about. Had heat coming through a radiator, but it was heat. I didn’t have to go out and chop the wood. I said, “man”, and then found out that in the men’s lounge. Lounge, there was, what a 25” TV. I said, “a TV”.
Raúl: Wow. Where has this place been all my life?
Dr. Banks: But people — but people were complaining bitterly about it. “Oh, this place is terrible. This –” But me and my friends because we lived the same kind of lifestyle we were saying, “man, this is — this is great”. And then, of course you had to go to class and all that. But that’s the other thing too, I had some — I had some, I don’t know if it’s Livingstone, but the two class advisors at Livingstone. They nurture students. They want students to do well, and they let you know that. Now, I had some science teacher, biology, organic chemistry, chemistry. They were, they were really good. My biology teachers in particular.
And we started projects — some projects around Livingstone’s campus. We decided — we formed a biology club. We decided we were going to name all the trees on the campus. Log them and all that. And we — took me, took us, three years. We never did finish. We turned the project over to somebody else in the club. Wrote papers, and I started learning about the Mayo Brothers and about Charles Drew and about other people and some of the advances that were taking place. Started learning and it really piqued my interest.
But the thing that really sold — well, okay, the thing that really got me going was at Livingstone my junior year — my sophomore year, junior year and then my last year. They — the Atomic Energy Commission had a program where they would sponsor students to come to their facility. They had one in Tennessee and one in Brookhaven, Long Island [inaudible] [18:56]. The Atomic Energy Commission and I went up there as a medical research department and I had a fellow named A.L. Carson who was my supervisor — my leader of my group, whatever. Anyway, he was a physician. He was doing research. Big facility. The world’s biggest library. Anything you want for research the government wanted to throw money at it and they did.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: Right next door to me was a guy named Cotzias. He was working on l-dopa. At the time, I got a chance to talk to him. Big veterinarian research center next door to us. I got a chance to talk to them, but they also had people who were dying of cancer and other diseases who agreed to come in and let research be done. Now, that wasn’t my — our area. I was working with rats and mice, trying to find remedies for radiation sickness. ‘Cause you know, the Cold War and all that. So, we were working on that and that was the project. And it was science, so I was into it. And me and Dr. Carson and the other staff, we got along well. And he was always patting me on the back, which I appreciate that. But he would allow me sometimes to go over to the unit where the people were, you know, and that was beginning to pique my interest more than anything else. And I was talking — so, some of the people started talking to me and all that. And they would talk to me. First, they thought I was a physician. “No, I’m not a physician, just a student”. And they’d be telling me stuff and then the doctor would come along, and I’d say, “oh, how’s so and so”, and he’d say, “Ah, I didn’t know they had that.” And so, they tell — start to tell me stuff they didn’t want to tell the doctors. And then the doctors would — would fill me in on what they were trying to do for them and stuff like that. And I started reading about it and I said, “hey,
this a chance to help somebody”. But anyway –Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: At any rate, the summer you have to — they pick students from each section to give the talk to bring up the whole facility and you’ve got to talk in front of the whole bunch of different — and they got me to do it.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: And so, I did it. And again, I don’t know if that was real, but I enjoyed doing it. I don’t like talking in front of people, but –
Raúl: Absolutely. So, this is an Atomic Energy Commission facility, and it was welcoming students?
Dr. Banks: Yeah. During the summer. They gave them grants. People in physics, biochemistry, organic chemistry, biology, then medical research, veterinary medicine. They had a campus for all of us students.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: And we lived in buildings. Everybody, you know. It was a big — huge campus and it turns out that while I was at Brookhaven National Laboratory, you can look all that stuff up if you want to, Brookhaven National Laboratory. The guy who became my roommate in here, he was out at — in Tennessee. I forgot what they call the name of that town, but he was in Tennessee. He went one year, but I went — I got invited back to Brookhaven three times and Dr. Carson said, “we don’t usually do this, but we’re inviting you back”. So, it got to the point I got to like the research and all that. So, I announced to my mother and Dr. Carson that “you know what, I think I just want to do research”. You know. He
said, “I thought you and your mother were mumbling around on something else, like possibly med school or something like that”. I said, “yeah, but I like this research”. And he said, “look”, and he said — he said “look, you can do what you want and if you want a job here, I’ll hire you, but you take your butt to med school and become a doctor” I mean — he just, really. He said, “I want to talk to your mother”. I said, “well my mother’s not going to make a bus trip up here”. He said, “Well, I’m going to write her a letter then”. I said, “you are?” I said, “Why you going to write my mother a letter”? He said, “I want to tell her that I agree with her that you
should go to med school and forget this stuff about research”. He
said — I said, “will you tell her that you’ll give me a job though if I don’t do that”? He said, “I’ll do that”. So, he did. So, my mother says, “well I got this letter from this Dr. Carson”. But anyway, so that was part of it, but — oh and that also when I did my interviews to go to med school everyone wanted to know, “what did you do at Brookhaven”? It was something crazy.Raúl: Yeah. It’s a very prestigious — it has that ring to it and it’s the Cold War, like you said.
Dr. Banks: But you have to sign an agreement that you won’t discuss the details of what you did. Now, the only people who pressed me and then got angry when I said no was down the street.
Raúl: Oh, here. Of course.
Dr. Banks: Duke.
Raúl: Oh, not here.
Dr. Banks: Duke. Yeah, no, it was Duke. And the guy kept pressing. He turned red. Yeah. I said, “I’m not allowed to talk about it”. “Really? And you a student, you were a student and you –”? I said, “yeah, but I had to sign that I wouldn’t talk about it”.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: So, he didn’t ask me. He just sat there and didn’t ask for another question. There were two other people in the room, and they asked one more question and I was out the door. I did find out I got accepted over there.
Raúl: Hey, that was going to be my other question.
Dr. Banks: But — but that didn’t go well with me because the two other places. I only interviewed three places. And I know I’m jumping up and down your line.
Raúl: It’s all good here.
Dr. Banks: I went three places. I did here, Meharry, and Duke. I got accepted at all three places. But I will say that this place, Nashville Medical Scholarships. You’ve heard of them, right?
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: Yeah. They were going to give me a scholarship. A, whatever you call it, to come here.
Raúl: Oh nice.
Dr. Banks: My mother, out of those choices, wanted me to come here. I decided I wanted to come here. So, I came here. But Meharry was nice, just so far away. I just got a bad taste in my mouth over there with the interview.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: The guys at actually seemed like they wanted me to come, but I don’t know. ‘Cause I ran into one of them after I was — school was going, they didn’t look too happy to see me, I said.
Raúl: When you were applying to medical school there, were there already many enrichment programs for Black medical students? Like, the MED program we have today.
Dr. Banks: Okay, tell me about that again now.
Raúl: The MED program?
Dr. Banks: Yeah.
Raúl: So, it’s an enrichment program. So that at the time in the early ’70’s when it was created, it was a way to recruit Black medical students and sort of, like, create an academic space in the summer before they started medical school.
Dr. Banks: Yeah, I — I don’t know about that program. The other program they did have here that I — they used to do externships. Do you still do that? I don’t know.
Raúl: No.
Dr. Banks: Okay, well. We got a chance to my —- the third year, fourth year, you could go to a community-based practice and work with a doctor who would agree to accept you and so, I went to a fantastic teacher in Tarboro named Lawrence McCutcheon. He also graduated from here. And, I went to, I can’t think of the guy’s name now. I went to another guy who was a great teacher down in Elizabeth City. That was another summer. And, Dr. George Debnam, he’s — he’s in Raleigh now, but he’s a Black family practitioner. But those guys were good. I got to spend time with — at doing an externship, so – oh, while I was in Tarboro with Dr. McCutcheon, there was another Black physician here. Oh my
goodness, I can’t call his name now, but Dr. McCutcheon would let me go over and spend one day a week with him, which was a whole different style of practicing medicine, but he was getting to his people.People trusted him with things that — and then part of my job, part of my externship was, I had to help cover the emergency room. So, when I would see a lot of his Dr. Quigley — Dr. Quigley’s patients in the emergency room, they would come on in. They start calling and say you know, “is Dr. Banks working”? And the ER staff would tell me that some of them would call in to make sure you were here. I say, “I’m just a student”, but I saw them at Dr. Quigley’s office, and they would come on in. And, Dr. Quigley’s office would say, “if he’s over there, go ahead”. And then I said, “look you get back to see Dr. Quigley’s and this that and the other”. And I’d let Dr. Quigley know. So, it was just building. I thank the good Lord kept throwing things at me, pointing me in a certain direction and every time I was getting down, he’d send somebody to kick me in the — to kick me.
Raúl: Kick it back into position.
Dr. Banks: Right, so –
Raúl: To where you needed to be.
Dr. Banks: But yeah.
Raúl: When you were admitted here into the school of medicine do you remember what sort of reputation the medical school had?
Dr. Banks: Honestly, I don’t remember. I just knew that it was Carolina and — and everybody in my hometown when they got super sick, they were sent here. So, I figured, must be a great place. So, but I don’t know much about a reputation as a med school. I just knew it was here, big and people came here if they wanted a last chance or something like that.
Raúl: Yeah. It was the big place.
Dr. Banks: So, yeah.
Raúl: But you were one of the few Black students in your class?
Dr. Banks: Only four in my class.
Raúl: Out of how many?
Dr. Banks: Out of 85.
Raúl: Oh, wow.
Dr. Banks: Yeah, just four. And, in the beginning, the four of us. Now, everybody came out of a — from a Black environment. I told you, I went to an all-Black high school. Melvin, my roommate did. Venita went to one in Elizabeth City.
Raúl: Ah, yes, Venita.
Dr. Banks: Venita Newby, I don’t know what her last name is now – Threak or something.
Raúl: Venita Newby. The name I have is still Venita Newby.
Dr. Banks: Yeah, okay.
Raúl: Melvin?
Dr. Banks: Melvin Clayton.
Raúl: Clayton.
Dr. Banks: Michael Robinson is the other one.
Raúl: And you?
Dr. Banks: And me. Just the four of us. In the beginning, it was like this. Just, but we realized that wasn’t going to work. ‘Cause half the time whatever section we’d sit in, that’s where the professor’s back was in about half the classes. So, we split up. And Melvin, that was my roommate, and we met ‘cause I had really, since I knew I was coming into an all-White environment, I had requested a single room. Just by myself. And so my folks dropped me off here. We didn’t see any Black faces anywhere. And, but we were used to it. My mother was a little bit disturbed by it in the beginning. Leaving her baby.
But — but, she would always say and my granddaddy too, ‘cause he came too. Now, he didn’t make trips, but he came too. He said, “look”, he said, “you –” and really they both said, “you have a job to do. Just focus on doing your job”. And my mother said, “don’t start no trouble, but don’t run from any trouble either. Keep your word. And anybody you meet” and this is the other thing. “Everybody you see, and I’m not seeing any Black people now”, she said, “but everybody you see with a Black face isn’t your friend, but everybody you see with a White face is not your enemy either. Just take people as they come”. And that’s what they left me with. And “you will not flunk out”. That was an order. From my mother. “You will not flunk out”.
Raúl: Don’t flunk out. Yes.
Dr. Banks: “Whatever work you’ve got to do, you do it”. And “when you don’t know, ask”. She’s always said that. “When you don’t know, ask”. She said, “don’t worry about looking foolish because if you go acting on information you don’t have, you’re going to look even more foolish”, she said.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: Ask. And that was repeated to me several times in class — in school. But I would say that again, learning a new vocabulary, meeting new people ‘cause being exposed to more things, different people, stuff like that. That was a good experience. Being again, — now, Livingstone I started living on my own. Making my own decisions, knew I had to be a student and work, but you don’t have your parents there to — to hold you up. So, that was the beginning of that. Then, I get here where you really got to be focused and determined to get your work done. Do it and you can’t worry about whether I’m going to get along with this or not getting along with this. You got to worry about getting the work done.
Fortunately, Melvin we met in the lobby of Craig Dorm and he said, “you Ken Banks”? and I said “yeah. You Melvin Clayton”? He said, “Yeah”. He says, “man you got a roommate”? I said, “no, I’m by myself”. He said, “man, I got a roommate”. He said, “why don’t you and I become roommates”? And we looked around. We still didn’t see another Black face. I said “okay”. So, we went across the campus and had everything changed. And we became — we still lifelong friends. We still friends. Still call each other. I was his best man at his wedding, and he was mine.
Raúl: Oh wow. That’s great.
Dr. Banks: But we just hit it off pretty good. So, we helped and the other thing. Now, all realized that there were people in the class a whole lot smarter than we were. And the only thing that — and actually, in the chemistry class we were sitting in there with a guy who had written chapters in the book that we were using to study.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: Yeah, and you think that wasn’t intimidating? That was intimidating. And once again, my mother said, “the only thing that means is that in the beginning he may know more than you, but if you do your job, at the end you’re all gonna know the same thing.”
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: She kept hammering me with stuff like that. And, of course, you gotta pray. You gotta start your day with a prayer. Just like before I came over here. But, every single day like that. But –
Raúl: Who were you closest to here besides, you know, Dr. Robinson?
Dr. Banks: I’m sorry.
Raúl: Besides Dr. Robinson?
Dr. Banks: Dr. Who?
Raúl: Melvin.
Dr. Banks: Melvin Clayton. Yeah, Melvin Clayton.
Raúl: Melvin Clayton. Sorry.
Dr. Banks: I was closest to Melvin Clayton and one other fellow. Well, one other classmate, his name was Richard Lowe. He’s dead now. He was from Texas. He was a White fellow, but he didn’t see color and we didn’t see color and he — we just — we just as if we were born from — in the same family. But I met him, we worked on a project together. I met him. One of the things we had to do was we had different professors had projects going on during the summer months. Some other parts of the year and we could volunteer to do them. And, we were working on, since I liked the chemistry and the science. This doctor, I think it was Carl Anderson I think, but we were working on how to help with deep malabsorption —
studying malabsorption. I think this one was in Costa Rica or somewhere. We were using a sugar called d-xylose. And we had to take it and had to get our classmates to drink a whole bunch of water. Then, we had to follow them around and collect urine. We had to collect all this urine and then run the test to see if it was a viable test for malabsorption called d-xylose.Well, people were pairing and up and when I was just sitting there. I decided I was going to do it by myself, and a fellow came up, stuck his hand and said, “hey, my name’s Dick Lowe. Man, I need a partner. How ‘bout it”? I looked at him. I should have been slapped for the way I looked at him, but — but I looked at him and I said, “okay, let’s try it out”. And let me tell you. That is one of the best handshakes, best friendships I have ever had in my life. And he died last summer. Yeah, but, we — I mean, we stayed like this. We visited him in Texas. He was from Houston, Texas. He visited with us. The other good thing about association — in Carolina, you know you pass by taking a national exam at the end of the year. Makes no difference whether you were good, bad, indifferent for the rest of the time. You don’t pass that exam at the end of the year.
Raúl: That’s it. Yeah.
Dr. Banks: But all of us. Well, not all of us — me, Melvin and Dick. We used to fire questions at each other. Did every subject to try and stay sharp, you know? We made a deal that you see us on the street, if you, if you in there watching a James Bond movie. I forgot the name of that movie theater downtown, it’s not there now. Ask us a question. Melvin and I were roommates. You gotta — I give you permission to wake me up in the middle of the night and ask me a question. And you know what? We felt and – we felt good doing it. It got to the point where some of our classmates would always ask, “what are you guys studying”? “What are you all studying”? “We don’t see you all out here”. “What are you studying”? We just said
“the same thing you study” and — but we kept asking. But anyway, we just formed a bond, and it was a way to try to stay up, get caught up and not be so — feel so intimidated by titles other people had. And we — and Melvin’s mother, like my mother also were praying mothers. So, she also said I’m praying for you and bless you all. So, it was kind of a nourishing thing, you know?Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: I’m leaving out something. I know I had a whole bunch of other stuff written and I’m sorry I didn’t bring it, but I’m leaving stuff out.
Raúl: This is great. Do you remember if you were close to some faculty here?
Dr. Banks: Okay, that’s a good question. Oh, the last other person I was close to during my tenure here at Carolina was my senior year I got married so I was close to her. And she was in journalism school here.
Raúl: Oh, really.
Dr. Banks: Yeah. So, she was in journalism school. Dick Lowe introduced us because he said, “you need some kind of activity”. He had — he had gotten married the summer before and he said, “man, you just spending too much time studying. You need an outlet”. So, he introduced me to Pam and well, anyway, we finally wound up getting married. But anyway — so now as far as faculty. I wasn’t really close to a lot of faculty. Oscar Sapp was class advisor, so any time I was feeling blue and couldn’t get home ‘cause there was no phone at home, take a letter. I’d talk to Sapp. He’d just say, “you’re gonna make it. You’re gonna be fine. He said, “remember when we admit you, we do our best to make you a doctor”. You
know? Let you out of here a physician and everybody hammers it. But the fellow — two physicians I really have a lot of respect for. One, he’s not here now. He left here and went to University of Rochester or somewhere. Anyways, Knight Steel. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard that name?Raúl: Knight Steel?
Dr. Banks: Knight Steel. He looked like Dick Clark from American Bandstand. You know, looked like a teenager. Little guy, but he was smart. Really smart, but compassionate. And I remember, I had to be on one of his rotations. And, I had to present. I don’t like talking in front of a bunch of people and in technical stuff too and I didn’t feel I knew enough. So, presented the first day and he said, “Ken, how about stopping by, you know, later when you get the chance”? And, I said, “okay”. I said, “oh, God, what did I do now”, you know?
So, he said “look, you gonna be presenting again probably next week, maybe this week. Even if you’re nervous, act like you own the room”. That’s one thing. He said, “but you know the patient you’re talking about. Don’t be nervous. Just say the facts you know. If somebody asks you a question you don’t know, just say, “I don’t know, let’s go find out”. And he said, “you may sweat. Don’t let them see you sweating, you know”? He said, “your skin may show it, but don’t let your body activity show it”. That’s the only time anybody at this place has ever said anything to me like that. But he was trying to help. And then, when I decided I was going to do family practice, you know, he let me know he was going up to Rochester. And, I forgot the name of that hospital, but anyway, it’s a big one. But he was an internal medicine guy, Knight Steel. The other guy is Jim Bryan.
Raúl: Jim Bryan?
Dr. Banks: Yeah, Jim Bryan. He used to run the outpatient clinic. He was internal medicine. And he was a helpful, friendly dude. Dude? Guy.
Raúl: I get what you mean. Yes.
Dr. Banks: He was helpful, friendly, and I won’t forget him. I won’t forget him. He taught me a lot. He taught me a lot about just doing your research, doing your work and not being afraid to put your diagnosis out there, even if it’s wrong. With your conclusions you can justify it, you know. So, he was a good teacher. Knight Steel was just excellent. Oscar Sapp was a good soother. I think I only ran into one professor here, I think, that actually just hated my guts.
Raúl: That was going to be another question. I mean, I was wondering if at any point during your training you were made to feel unwelcome or like you didn’t belong in this place?
Dr. Banks: Well, let me say — oh, well, okay. Well, that one professor, I won’t call his name, but his initials are A.F., but I won’t call his name. There were some professors who just, do like, I’d rather be talking to somebody else than talking to these people. There — we had some — some classmates who, I think in four years’ time never said a word to me in four years. I’ve had some classmates — I had some classmates who actually and, “what’s your story”, “how’d you get here”? Not having met me. Met me for the first time, knew nothing about me or anything like that.
And only one. The first time it happened, I got extremely angry because of how they were standing and the way they act. And I said, “well, it may have had something to do with my MCAT scores or it may have had something to do with how — where I graduated, my rank, or it may have had something to do with the three years I did research at Brookhaven National Laboratory”. I said, “you know, maybe. I don’t know”. I said, “but I tell you what, don’t ever approach me again,” and I let it go like that. But the majority of the students, though, seemed to be open and welcoming. If you treated them fine, they treated you fine. There were some of them, like Dick Lowe, that was extremely nice, respectful, and helpful so I don’t want to brand everybody negatively. It was more positive than negative. I, you know, I couldn’t have made it without Carolina anyway with what I’m doing and then — so, if I had to do it all over again, I’d come right back here and do it again.
Raúl: You mentioned earlier — I’m very interested in learning about things outside of medical school that sort of kept you steady and you mentioned meeting your wife when you were a medical student. Were there other things that, you know, outside of medical school kept you steady?
Dr. Banks: Mainly — no, just friends. Friends from home, my parents, my grandfather. But, just friends and once I got married, we had to move out of the dorms — move out of Craig dorm into the married student housing and we met some really nice people there, so we did do some things with them. And we did go to some amusement park a couple of times. And we actually went bowling. And Dick and his wife and Pam and I — we went to the movies and stuff like that together, but other than that I’m drawing a blank right now. There was more than that, but –
Raúl: Was there a time — can you remember a time when you asked for help here in medical school?
Dr. Banks: I think it was — no, let’s see. You mean like with studying or –
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: The only person that even remotely – again, Knight Steel. I mean, if I had a topic to talk about in his group and it was my turn up, he just slipped me some reading material, but I’m trying to think. I know it had to be. I just can’t think of anybody else right now.
Raúl: That’s okay. Also –
Dr. Banks: Oh well, the other thing is Jim Bryan. Now, this was outside of here though. But my mother was seeing a doctor in, I think Elizabeth City, because of skin problems, joint problems, stuff like that. And I went home one — and he wasn’t doing much of anything for her. I went home on, I guess it was spring break or something, and she was telling me about how she was feeling, and I saw the — the rash and all that. I said, “well, what’s his — what’s his diagnosis?” “I have arthritis”. And I said, “what about this?” “Well, part of arthritis”. “What are you doing for it”? “Taking aspirin”. I said, “mom, you need to get some other testing”. So, when I got back here, I told Dr. Bryan about it and he
asked me, “what are you thinking”? “We need to check, she’s Black, she’s losing her hair, she might have lupus, I don’t know”. He said, “well, why don’t you call the doctor and suggest it to him”? Well, I had to write the doctor, you know, but –Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: My mother said he got so angry. said he was, “your son is just a medical student he doesn’t know anything” — he said “I’m the doctor, he doesn’t know. I know”. Anyway, so I said, “Dr. Bryan, if I can get my mother to come up would you see her”? He saw her and she had lupus.
Raúl: Lupus?
Dr. Banks: She had systemic lupus. It was beginning to affect her kidneys, her joints, her skin, and that’s what killed her eventually.
Raúl: Geez.
Dr. Banks: And so, when she went back so — Dr. Bryan. Nice note. Mother went back, took the note to the doctor. He kicked her out of his practice.
Raúl: Oh, no.
Dr. Banks: So, then she used to come up here and see Dr. Bryan.
Raúl: Very territorial. Wow.
Dr. Banks: Kicked her out because she got the proper help she needed. That registered with me. I, that made — I’m telling you.
Raúl: Yeah, geez. All for asking for a second opinion.
Dr. Banks: And getting one and getting the correct one ‘cause he wasn’t, — ‘cause he was letting her die.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: So, Dr. Bryan told him, “look, you know, her titers are way up here and we see the skin already”. He said, “you saw that. You told me about the kidneys and the urine and maybe some of the heart”. And, sure enough she developed lupus cerebritis and the works. So, that’s something and I always tell people now. Look, don’t let your ego get in the way. Don’t let your ego cause you to harm somebody else. Don’t do it. I don’t care.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: I don’t care if you’re — what was his name. What was the doctor who used to be on television? I can’t even think — call his name now. But Marcus Welby was my idol. He was on television. But you probably don’t even know who that is?
Raúl: Yeah. Oh, from the TV show. Yeah.
Dr. Banks: But anyway, that’s probably taking you away from where you wanted to go with that, but –
Raúl: This is – this is all excellent and very relevant. When you said that you started to lead towards family med at some point, I’m guessing in the second half of training?
Dr. Banks: Yeah. Actually, okay, it started hitting me in several places. One, just going and doing those externships and actually working with people instead of just the textbooks. And the specialized patients get up here, ended up here. Here, when they make rounds up here these are people who had been down there, and nobody could figure out what’s wrong with them. Everyday people, everyday working people during the externships I got to get a feel for people. And then to have people start to trust you with stuff they’re not even telling their own regular doctor, but just trust you. You know that makes you feel, makes you feel different. Feel, you know, maybe this is what you should be doing. You know?
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: And, up there in Brookhaven, you know, Dr. Carson could see that I enjoyed spending more time with those sick patients, people. Which is where I was not supposed to be, but I did with messing with a bunch of rats. But I did my job. Don’t know, so. I –
Raúl: When it came time to think about residency. Now like, more specifically and a bit, how did you choose what to do?
Dr. Banks: Oh, where to go you mean?
Raúl: What to do? Where to go?
Dr. Banks: Yeah. I went to some places. How many places, I forgot. I was looking for — I decided I wanted to do family practice. And I’m trying to decide. I think I went to three places again. Always three for some reason. But I went to Franklin Square Hospital.
Raúl: Okay.
Dr. Banks: That’s in Baltimore. And, they had never had a Black resident before. I didn’t know that until after I was already there. I didn’t know that. Never. And — but anyway, when I got there for my interview I met — I met this — this tall — He was head of the department, he died, he just died last year also. Name William Reichel. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of him, but he’s written a bunch of books, he’s traveled to Russia on behalf of this country.
Raúl: Uh-huh.
Dr. Banks: He’s just a big man, but when he came in, you know, he’s about — he’s almost 7’ tall, looks like.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: But and he has this thing. He only looks at shoes. So a friend of mine went to the interview with me and he came in. And he was all eyes always down and he was talking about the program and how they’d really like to have me and all this kind of stuff, you know. Didn’t ask me about Brookhaven or any of that kind of stuff. He talked quite general, talked about people in general. He was trying to find out my values and how I felt about people in general.
Raúl: Uh-huh.
Dr. Banks: And, he told me about the place and about the family practice. He started the family practice department at Franklin Square Hospital. He started it. And, but he never told me I was going to be the first Black resident there. So, but anyway, he said “well, I know the sign period”, whatever you call that thing, he said “it’s going to be ending soon. I hope you put us down. We’d like to have you”. So, when riding back my friend and I, my high school friend and I, he said, “man I don’t know if you’re going to get in there cause he never even looked at us. He just looked at our feet”. But that turned out to be his thing. And that’s why we always tease him. All the residents teased him. But I went there and when I got there it was interesting, you know. I wound up there ‘cause most internships start on July 1 and stuff like that or July 4th, whatever it is. So, I — my wife and I, we, and my brothers helped move all my junk from here to up there.
Raúl: Uh-huh.
Dr. Banks: And we get to the place that we’re staying and — which is right down the street from the hospital, and we move in and again we didn’t see too many of us there. But so went over to the hospital and to let Dr. Reichel know I landed and all that kind of stuff. He said, “well, we’ll see you in the morning” and stuff like that. But, and so the next day I went in with this white coat on and all that stuff. People — you know, even — even my Black people would look, but they were friendly, and they started slapping me on the back and this kind of stuff. I get on the elevator, everybody just standing there waiting for me to push all the buttons. I’m telling you the truth, this is how it was back then. ‘Cause I went to all to get to the — sorry — Franklin Square in ’73, that’s when I graduated from here, but people still not — but, and then my first day there I’m on call. Guess what?
Raúl: Oh.
Dr. Banks: Yeah. I’m on call for the CCU?
Raúl: Oh, wow.
Dr. Banks: But I learned, but I — I was scared, but I learned. I kept my textbook with me at all times. And, even when I would be off duty and go home. I took rhythm strips, EKG strips home with me and learned how to use them. I learned every kind of code there was to know and stuff like that. I mean, and my wife would just say, “what you bringing all these strips home for”? I’m going over them. And, in my — we had to carry around black bags like had my textbook in it so because they’re, and I called that along with practice my number one learning experience. Because, what you said affected so many people and the lives of so many people, so you had to be right you know, with what you were telling them to
do, asking them to do. And — and you have to do it to get their confidence and trust. I’m talking about the staff now too as well as the patients.Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: But, once you do that, you home free, but you gotta do it and, you know, everybody’s looking for you to make that one mistake. And everybody’s gonna make a mistake, but you have to minimize that. And if you do make it, you gotta own up to it and try your best to correct it. But I remember and I know that’s another one of your questions too, about high points. I have a whole bunch of them in my life that the good Lord put my way, but when I was on call that first week ‘cause you have to do it every other day. There was — I ran an ACLS protocol on a patient and he made it.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: And I’m standing there giving the orders. Telling them this one do this, do that, without looking at the book. But I had studied all that stuff in case of — in case, you know — I had a patient who got himself transferred from Union Memorial Hospital in Baltimore over to our hospital Franklin Square in Baltimore. He had had a heart attack and he had himself moved out of there and into our hospital. You know why?
Raúl: Why?
Dr. Banks: ‘Cause they had moved a Black patient in his room. He was going to have a Black roommate and guess how he looked when I came walking around the corner?
Raúl: Nice.
Dr. Banks: He just gave up, but his wife was there, and she was trying to be nice. She didn’t tell me all this stuff. But anyway, the guy, he was sick. So, we had to wind up putting a pacemaker in him and all that kind of stuff. And he did fine. And, before he left — so, I used to go back and check on him, but I could tell that his attitude was changing. It was softening, softening, softening. And so, the day he was discharged he said, “I got something for you”. And you know what he gave me?
Raúl: What?
Dr. Banks: A Booker T. Washington silver dollar.
Raúl: What?
Dr. Banks: He said, “I want you to keep it. Don’t use it. Don’t sell it and remember me when you do”. And then about a year later he died, and the wife mailed the pacemaker back to me.
Raúl: What?
Dr. Banks: Back to the hospital. She just wanted to say thank you and maybe this could help somebody else. But those are the stories that — things that kept me alive.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: Things that kept me going. But anyway –
Raúl:Do you remember, you know, if there was a special moment or special event when you felt that you came into your own as a medical professional?
Dr. Banks: Well, there was — man, there’s so many, but the ACLS one was one.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: My — at Franklin Square I was — I became the chief resident. I mean, that hadn’t been done before.
Raúl: Right.
Dr. Banks: And it was unanimous. My other residents voted me in and Dr. Reichel put his stamp on it. I was chief resident for a year before I, you know, left. That was a high point for me. Going out we had to do a prison rotation.
Raúl: Really?
Dr. Banks: Yeah. I did not like that, but you went over there, and it was the guy name Dilos Santos, he was — he and I — well, it was his rotation. I was rotating throughout his office and that was one of his jobs. And he was telling me about what happened to their last doctor. Why they — why he quit. The prisoners were throwing urine and feces on him and all that kind of stuff. So, Dr. Santos — and but — and we’d always arrived there at the free time when they all out. When they lined up, we had to walk through them and all that.
So, we were seeing the patients, we’d go see the patients and Dr. Santos over here, I’m over here. And this one guy was — he was telling me, “hey, you know, I got this, I got that. Other doctor wouldn’t do this”. “Well, look, let’s start fresh”. The guy got well. Got better. He did great. Now, what he told me was — he said, “doc”, ‘cause I wouldn’t be seeing him again. He was going to be released anyway. He was doing great. He said, “if you ever have any trouble anywhere in this city, anywhere”, he said, “of any kind. He said, “you just let me know about it”. He said, “if anybody bothers your house, bothers you, mess with your car”, he said, “you let me know”. And I said, “go old man. Okay”.
Anyway, so I was telling Dr. Santos and I also told the warden what he said, and the warden said, “yeah, he can do it. He’s got the pull on the outside he can do it”. I said, “really”? So, he said, “you
didn’t give any of your personal information”? I said, “no, not at
all. Not at all”. But I tell you what and then another one invited me out to dinner at this place in Baltimore that I never go on that side of town anyway, but I went, and I went in and when I walked in the door, man, everybody looked around. Music stopped. I said, “uh-oh”. And he came running out the back. Said, “no, he’s with me. He’s with me”. Everything was fine. And he just wanted to say thanks for treating him like a human being.Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: So, all that stuff was playing in my mind. So, the other thing was when I left Franklin Square Hospital. Now, one of the things that Dr. Reichel wanted all of us to do when he started, he created a family practice center inside our residency. Inside the hospital. Each one of us had to have our own family practice. Now, you know, the hospital pays the rent, all that kinds of stuff. But, the family practice secretary was our secretary and stuff like that. So, we had her, but when I left there at the end of my year, I had the hospital administrator and his family for patients, the assistant hospital administrator, some of the doctors, and the nurses as patients. So, I felt so proud of that. And, then I was asked to stay.
Raúl: Uh-huh.
DR. Banks: And, stupid me said “no, I gotta go back home. I got to go back to North Carolina. I got to go back home”. And –
Raúl: Why do you think that was a stupid move?
Dr. Banks: I mean, I already had a reputation, I already had a clientele I could build off. I was already promised a ton of money. Well, not a ton of money, but I was already promised money. I needed to buy a new car, didn’t have the money for that. I could have done all that stuff. But I just felt and even my mother says, “stay up there”. Really. She says, “stay up there”. I said, mom, “I just can’t. I got to go back and work. I got to go back” and — now, this sounds self-serving, I know, but that was the conversation. So, I left, dragged my wife and came on back down.
Raúl: Where did you come?
Dr. Banks: Initially, well, I did that 30 days in Edenton with — for Dr. Slade and then I went to Williamston, North Carolina for about a year. And Dr. Sampson Harrell convinced me to come and join him here.
Raúl: Oh.
Dr. Banks: Come and join him in Durham. So, he and I spent a few years together and I decided to branch out on my own.
Raúl: And you had — well, in a way you had to start over again when you came back here?
Dr. Banks: Yeah.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: But it — I mean, when I went to Williamston. Yeah, that was. The need was such that, you know, they had advertised that a new doctor was coming. When we opened the door, we must have seen 60-65 people that first day.
Raúl: Oh my God.
Dr. Banks: First day.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: There was just such a need, you know.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: And, I said, well I made the right decision, but man was I tired. I was tired.
Raúl: Holy smokes, that’s a lot of work.
Dr. Banks: That’s a — oh, yeah, a lot of work.
Raúl: Jeez. When you think about your long trajectory as a physician, what has your experience taught you about the best ways that we can support our minority students?
Dr. Banks: Well, doing what you’re doing is one thing. Any time they get a chance to go to some doctor’s office that they respect and see how it’s done, get to know people. That’s another thing they can do. Just keep reading, studying. Keep themselves up. Hit people hard for scholarship money to help with projects for these — for these people. You know, you start with the Black alumni doctors. Hey, we trying to — That’s what the National Medical Scholarship does, they get donations.
Raúl: They do.
Dr. Banks: They ask for them. I mean, you guys can do the same thing. And, they have to decide — want to get a look. Is this really what I want to do? You know, because, if you are half way, you’re going to be miserable, and the practice is going to fail if you’re — my ego won’t allow me to touch this or that.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: You know. But I would have, again, doctors’ practices that are working. Scholarship money if you got it. I’d ask the students to go volunteer, like when they’re having — I don’t know blood drives and whatnot, maybe not blood drives — help. Places they can help, soup kitchens they could help. Anywhere they can learn about people and their problems and realize that some people are a whole lot worse than they are and can use their help. Because it really — physician and, that’s the other thing — well, okay so, they have to decide if they want to be a physician or a doctor/mechanic. I see — I see them differently. If you spend most of your time not even looking at the patient, not even touching the patient, just –
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: That turns me off to no end. That’s probably why I’m out practice. Why I retired now. You have to decide and — how hard you’re willing to fight for your patient. Learning about people and their needs helps you to decide how you want to be. I’ve had so many fights with insurance companies about this patient needs this. Oh no, no no, we’re not gonna — they’re not gonna do that, we’re not going to pay for that. They need it. And, then you gotta go and you gotta keep fighting until you get to some kind of director who says, go on get your test done, but that takes a lot of work for one patient. Not everybody wants to do that. But we did it in our office. There’s so many things about our office that I’m so proud of before I retired. I –
Raúl: That was going to be my last question. The things that you are proud of over your long career, and I mean, you brought up this issue about fighting for your patients. Doing more than just checking a box or writing notes –
Dr. Banks: Yeah. Actually, getting to know the patients. I mean, actually getting to know them. A lot of my patients they called friends. It’s not just doctor. But, I mean, I used to get asked some of my patients who didn’t have fathers. I’ve walked three young ladies that I wasn’t even related to down the aisle.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: ‘Cause their fathers was dead. I’ve gone to family reunions, family gatherings, all that kind of stuff, you know. I’ve been in churches with some of my patients and been asked to stand up and speak. I said, “whoa, whoa that ain’t my — you know, that ain’t my thing”. But anyway. But I think the kind of practice we had, I mean, we actually cared about people. I think people knew that and so we were seeing generation after generation of people coming. But I would tell any student right now again, volunteer, you know, read all you can read, study, learn. Learn that do unto others as you had them do unto you. That’s extremely important.
Whoever your — whoever you believe in as your higher power and I believe in God, that’s my higher power. Visit him every day even if it’s short. Visit him every day. If there are people you can trust, then trust them. Let them help you. If they want to help you, let them help you. Don’t let pride get in the way. Don’t let your ego get in the way. I would also tell the student, or potential student anyway, go dig up the Hippocratic oath. There’s two of them, there’s the classical one and there’s a revised one. Read it. Just read it. Understand it and read it. If you can do that, if that — what he’s saying if what Hippocrates is saying is inside of you, then full steam ahead. If you decide oh, gee, you know what he’s saying, I can’t do that. You put the patients about this and that. Above, conscious — taking advantage of the patients — I’m not going to do. I you can’t do what he’s saying in that oath. If you can’t take the oath, then you shouldn’t be a physician. I read that oath. You know when I first read that doggone oath?
Raúl: When?
Dr. Banks: I read that oath the night of — let me see, the night before I was to graduate from here.
Raúl: Wow.
Dr. Banks: I read it then, but I believed that I believed what was in it. You know, the whole time and I had a — of course, they give us one, but I had a big one blown up. I had the original blown up and I had the classical one blown up and it was in my office. I put them at my house and my office. It’s the first thing you see when you get up or when you come in the office, first thing you see and the last thing I see when I’m leaving that office. So, I believe that you gotta actually care about people so — and again, if it’s not in you, no harm, no shame. Go do something else that is — not crime but go do something else that is in you. But that’s what I would say.
And you can find out by spending time with people. Spending
time with patients, going to somebody’s doctor’s office. Whe — when I was in practice, I had a lot of students. I had some of my Carolina students, even some of the White students to come through. And I put them through — make rounds at 6:00 in the morning. I didn’t make them make evening rounds unless they wanted to. But they had to come make rounds and we’d see patients. I’d introduce them to the patient and then go see what you — if I knew what they were here for and tell them, go see what you can find out, and then we’d discuss it. Didn’t rush them. Put us behind, but I felt they deserved that. They deserved that.And the people who did it for me helped me a lot. Dr. Reichel and again, tall, but that guy was a compassionate man. He always talked about patient dignity. He always — and one time we made rounds and he was the attending that time. And he wanted everybody to listen to this man’s heart murmur. Okay, so there was about six of us. I’m the last one and I ask the patient, “is it okay if I take a listen to you”? And I did and when we got back to the room to discuss the patient, you know the only thing Dr. Reichel talked about? Asking the patient, is it okay with them? And so he kind of started patting me on the back and I didn’t want that cause that, you know. But, he said, you always have to let the patient have his dignity and respect. And you can’t go in there like you’re going to
beat them up. He said, ask them. Talk to them. You know, don’t just put your stethoscope up to them. So, I was glad I did that, but that was home training, you know?Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: I have to go back to my mother for that. But it’s — you know, I had a whole bunch of things written out. High points, but I — there’s just too many of them.
Raúl: This is amazing. What you’ve given us here is extraordinary. I took a lot of extra notes on top because I need — I need to think about more of these. Yeah.
Dr. Banks: But care. They just gotta care. They just gotta care.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: And then do. They got to value that patient more and sometimes it’s hard for some people, but more than their pocketbook they gotta care about that patient first.
Raúl: Yeah.
Dr. Banks: I guess maybe that’s the bottom line. Do unto others and just caring and using the skill the good Lord let you acquire to do some good. And that higher power. I mean, I don’t — I don’t do anything without prayer first, man. Every day, that’s — but that’s me. Not everybody believes on God. I’m not trying to force my God on anybody. But just — they may say, “oh, dollar bill get me through this day.
Raúl: Who knows?
Dr. Banks: And that’s fine. If that’s their higher power, fine. I think they’re getting cheated if that’s their higher power. But –
Raúl: Thank you Dr. Banks. This is amazing.
Dr. Banks: If I were you, I would just tear that all up. Just tear it up.
[End of Audio]
Duration: 76 minutes
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About
Dr. Banks was born and raised in Edenton, NC in 1947. He attended Livingstone college where he encountered several inspiring and nurturing science professors, especially in biology. While attending Livingstone formed a biology club. In his junior year he conducted research with the Atomic Energy Commission in Brookhaven, Long Island studying radiation treatment. At the conclusion of the program, he was selected to present the facility’s summer research and was invited back three years in a row; an unprecedented accomplishment. Upon graduation, he was accepted to the , Meharry Medical College, and Duke School of Medicine. He chose because it was the closet to home and the place where he had the best interview experience. He went on to become the first Black family medicine resident, and later chief resident by unanimous vote, at the Franklin Square Hospital of Baltimore. After his residency Dr. Banks returned to North Carolina where he practiced until he retired.-
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