It was almost a year ago that Jamaican-born neurosurgeon Odette Harris, MD, MPH was named Professor of Neurosurgery at Stanford University, becoming the first black, and Jamaican, woman to hold the position at an Ivy League school in the United States. Harris is also perform surgery at Stanford Health Care.
In an article published by Stanford Medicine last year, Harris explained it was people who believed in her and gave her the fortitude to pursue her goals. Teachers, family members and even a nun are among those who she says helped fuel her fire to succeed, and imparted in her a love for science and mathematics.
With her success deeply tied to community, support and love, Harris is passionate about mentoring others.
Incredibly optimistic
“I’m an incredibly optimistic person,” Harris told Stanford Medicine. “Yes, I’m very hopeful. I believe that hope has to be coupled with opportunity. We can’t just rest on hope. We can’t just say, ‘This is getting better. Things are getting better.’ We all have a responsibility to continue to make sure that those accomplishments and achievements continue and that there’s opportunity for people,” she said.
However, Harris’ story has not been free from obstacles.
Challenges due to race and gender
As she explained to Stanford Medicine, “You’re black, you’re a woman, you’re in an all-white hospital – patients are constantly reminding you of that. I could list probably a hundred different experiences where I was asked to empty the garbage, or take out the trays, or clean out the toilets when I was just there to use the bathroom myself.”
Multifaceted pioneer
A multifaceted pioneer, Harris holds many prestigious and influential roles.
For instance, since 2009, she has been the Associate Chief of Staff of Polytrauma at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System and the Site Director/Principal Investigator of the Defense Veterans and Brain Injury Center in Palo Alto. Much of her work delves into her interest on how trauma affects men and women soldiers differently.
Harris graduated from Dartmouth College in 1991. She then went on to study medicine at Stanford University, where she was the only black woman in her class at medical school, and the only woman during her residency.
She also completed a master’s degree in public health in epidemiology at University of California, Berkeley in 2001.
By 2007, she joined Louisiana State University, where she worked on peripheral neuropathy, and went on to complete a fellowship at the University of the West Indies in Jamaica.
Undoubtedly, Harris is an anomaly. Statistics from the Association of Women Surgeons indicate that in 2015, women comprised only 19.2 percent of all surgeons in the US.
However, Harris is determined to assist in bulldozing the grossly lagging rate of women to men, and miniscule number of black women overall, in her industry. “I work really hard to make sure that in the next generation there’s representation for everyone at the table who wants to be there,” she explains.
