Dr. Chris Pernell, a regular medical commentator on CNN, has recently raised concerns about President Donald Trump's health, specifically his diagnosis of chronic venous insufficiency.
Despite her medical background, it appears that Dr. Pernell has not practiced medicine since her residency, instead focusing her career on diversity, equity, and inclusion. She also holds a religious role as an "apostle" in a church whose leader has publicly labeled Trump as the "antichrist."
According to The Washington Free Beacon, Dr. Pernell, who frequently appears on CNN and other news outlets, warned that President Trump's diagnosis might be more serious than it appears. "It is a disease that is progressive," Pernell stated. "And what that means is that if there aren't conservative treatments, elevation, compression, medication, if needed, to treat accompanying ulcers or skin changes, it can worsen and actually put a person at risk for deep venous thrombosis."
She further elaborated on the potential complications of chronic venous insufficiency, stating, "If a person is sitting or standing for prolonged amounts of time, you can get chronic venous insufficiency, and while it is not life threatening, it can be debilitating. You can develop ulcers in addition to skin discoloration. And if a person develops ulcers, you want to make sure those ulcers aren't infected."
Despite her medical degree from Duke University School of Medicine and a residency at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, there is no mention of Dr. Pernell treating patients on her LinkedIn page. After her time at Duke and Johns Hopkins, and earning a Masters degree in public health from Columbia, Pernell served as the "Chief Strategic Integration and Health Equity Officer" at University Hospital in Newark, New Jersey.
In this role, she developed the hospital's first "equity and inclusion strategy," hired its first "director of equity and inclusion," and implemented mandatory implicit bias and structural racism training.
During an October 2022 appearance on the Karen Hunter Show, Pernell revealed that she faced multiple compliance probes from hospital leadership, largely due to her public criticism of Trump and Republicans. In 2021, she compared vaccine-skeptical Americans to white supremacists on MSNBC.
Pernell resigned from the hospital a month before her unsuccessful campaign to become CEO. She claimed during her conversation with Hunter that she had been "forced out," attributing her departure to racism. "I have had an outpouring of physiciansin particular black physicians, black corporate executives, women generally, and people throughout the field of medicine and public healthstand up and say, 'What happened to you, unfortunately, is a part of a pattern of abuse,'" Pernell stated. "'It is an abusive relationship between white power structures and black executives.'"
Currently, Pernell serves as the director of the NAACP's Center for Health Equity, where she works to "drive equitable health outcomes and transform healthcare systems through a comprehensive socioeconomic approach valuing the whole person," as per her LinkedIn profile.
Pernell's work in New Jersey led to her appointment on the New Jersey Reparations Council's health equity committee. In this role, she approved a report advocating for reparations, non-citizen voting, ending deportations, and a new state agency to expand homeownership to Black New Jersey families.
In addition to her work on equity, Pernell has pursued a religious career as an "apostle" of the Bet Hashem YHWH church movement, founded by her brother, Timothy Pernell Jr. Timothy Pernell Jr. has made controversial statements about white Evangelical Christians and Trump, accusing them of being agents of Satan.
In response to a request for comment from The Washington Free Beacon, Pernell explained her professional focus. "As a board certified preventative medicine and public health physician and fellow, my practice is firmly rooted in population health, health equity, and health systems transformation," she wrote in an email. "My credentials and professional background have been demonstrated through over a decade of experience in community health, workplace health, and public health."
While Pernell's curriculum vitae does show her residency at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, her description of her time there includes tasks like facilitating and managing public health projects, performing policy and literature reviews, and orchestrating public health messaging campaigns, rather than treating patients.
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