National Medical Fellowships (NMF) welcomes Félix Manuel Chinea, M.D., director of health equity and inclusion strategy at Doximity, to its Board of Directors.

Health equity is always top of mind for Dr. Félix Manuel Chinea. Each day, he works to apply a more inclusive lens to health technology practices and products at Doximity, the leading digital platform for U.S. medical professionals.

As part of this work, Dr. Chinea also understands the value of diversity in driving innovation. When NMF began increasing its social media presence over the past few years, he was drawn to the organization’s mission to diversify the health care workforce—a goal he sees as critical to the success of the industry.

“To remain competitive in any industry, we must first make sure teams are filled with people with different perspectives and lived experiences to fuel questions that inspire new ideas.”

Dr. Chinea understands what it feels like to be one of a few in a room.

“I grew up in North Carolina on a military base with a strong Puerto Rican community,” he said. “My sense of self was fostered and supported there. Then, we moved to a civilian area in Georgia, and it was a stark culture shock.

“It made me question whether I had a voice in certain situations or not.”

He also witnessed the ramifications of health disparities when his abuelo lost his eyesight due to diabetes, while family members of his white friends had not.

“I quickly realized our community was being left behind and there needed to be more of us in health care,” Dr. Chinea said.

Dr. Chinea earned his undergraduate degree in biochemistry and molecular biology from the University of Georgia.

“During college, I also sought history that was not made available in public education, including the longstanding history of Puerto Ricans in the U.S. and their contributions to social justice movements nationwide,” he said, specifically referencing the New York Young Lords’ occupation of the South Bronx’s Lincoln Medical Center in 1970 to demand improved medical care for low-income residents.

“Their story led to the creation of one of the first patients’ bill of rights in history, which is now such a pillar and established structure within medicine, and I never before knew that,” he added.

While attending Duke University School of Medicine, Dr. Chinea also helped conduct health equity research, including a clinical trial focused on diabetes in the Latine community at the Joslin Diabetes Center.

After graduation, he joined the University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine as a postdoctoral fellow in radiation oncology, where he highlighted the need for disaggregated data within the Latine community to address disparities in prostate cancer outcomes. Then Dr. Chinea considered how he might make greater impacts outside of academic medicine.

“When I stepped back and challenged myself to consider the changes I wanted to see in health care, I began to imagine other roles aligned with systemic change. Health technology was growing at the time, and the conversations and products being created were incredibly interesting to me.”

Dr. Chinea, who began his work with Doximity as a senior medical content strategist in 2019, has since been recognized by The Aspen Institute, Rock Health, Business Insider, Forbes, and more for his current role as head of Health Equity and Inclusion Strategy.

“Doximity’s mission is to help every physician be more productive and provide better care for their patients,” Dr. Chinea said. “With Doximity, physicians can complete their admin work and conduct telehealth visits. They can also connect with peers, navigate residency program information and new career opportunities, and receive curated information and news most relevant to their clinical practice.

“For example, a cardiologist practicing in Alabama can open the Doximity Newsfeed to find information concerning health policies in their area and practice-changing developments in their field.”

Dr. Chinea said more than 80% of U.S. physicians are members of Doximity.

“Therefore, we’re always discussing ways to design our platform to be more inclusive and user-friendly,” he added. “The topic of health equity is an old one in medicine but a new one in tech.”

“At Doximity, we’ve intentionally defined health equity in alignment with our mission and the products we build,” he said. We do this by advancing telehealth equity through our Dialer for Free Clinics program, which offers unlimited access to our mobile telehealth platform, Dialer Pro, to all free medical clinics in the United States. We also do this by becoming a more inclusive medical network and affirming identities on our platform through pronouns and name pronunciation features on our members’ profiles.”

Not only does he believe this work is critical to improving the health for historically marginalized communities, but also Dr. Chinea emphasizes that “centering equity by design creates broad benefits for everyone because it unlocks the curb-cut-effect.”

What is estimated as $320 billion in direct medical costs for health care systems could in fact become a trillion-dollar business opportunity, Dr. Chinea added, the modeling conducted by Deloitte highlights how addressing health equity gaps across the United States could add $2.8 trillion to the US gross domestic product by 2040.

“If our goal is for a healthier country, we already know that this does not happen when ignoring historically marginalized communities. Whether we’re talking about clinical trial participation, physician representation or health technology, the opportunity to improve outcomes is from designing for and with those who have been historically excluded.”

That line of thinking leads to the development of solutions that address the needs of diverse populations. “Through collaboration with our teams, I’ve witnessed how designing products for those on the margins can have a broad, positive impact for all our members. For tech and health care more broadly, there is a clear opportunity to challenge the status quo and zero-sum-thinking by embracing health equity as a strategic priority that generates sustainable value for everyone.”