Institutional racism in healthcare is receiving increased attention, including special issues of The BMJ in 2020 and 2025. The misconception that race is a biological category instead of a social construct persists in the public consciousness and among healthcare professionals. Healthcare professionals should lead the way in dispelling this notion to improve medical care. The misuse of race in clinical equations leads to prediction errors and missed diagnoses. Treatment recommendations based on race are made despite studies showing no reliable differences in drug response by race. There are racial inequities in pain management resulting from assumptions about biological differences in pain tolerance. In modern medical schools, there is a lack of consensus on these topics in the canonical curriculum.