Dr. Annette Finley Mayes ’79: A Longtime Advocate for Women’s Health and Equity in Healthcare
This article appeared in the 2024 edition of Full Circle, Castilleja's annual magazine.
In her thirty years of practice as an obstetrician and gynecologist, Annette Finley Mayes ’79 has delivered thousands of babies. She’s treated thousands of women for issues ranging from infertility to endometriosis and taught hundreds of doctors.
As the first in her family to graduate from college, Dr. Mayes sees Castilleja as an essential stepping stone along her path. “Castilleja honestly opened up a whole new world for me. My mother worked right down the street in a medical lab. We were so close to the area, and we knew nothing about Castilleja,” says Dr. Mayes, who grew up in East Palo Alto as the youngest of six kids.
Then, in 6th grade, a teacher in her public school took her and three other classmates aside. “You are really smart,” the teacher said. “I’m going to talk to your parents and see if they’ll allow me to have you get tested to see if you can get into this private school.” What followed was two months of rigorous studying for the admissions exam. Dr. Mayes and another girl ended up enrolling in Castilleja.
The adjustment to a new school wasn’t easy for Dr. Mayes. She missed her siblings and old classmates. “Just stay,” her mother urged. “You will appreciate it later.” And she did.
Dr. Mayes went on to earn her BS from Stanford University, completed medical school at the University of California San Diego, and did her postgraduate OB-GYN residency at the University of Texas, Houston. Committed to advancing women’s health and combating racial inequities in healthcare, Dr. Mayes has her own medical practice in Las Vegas and writes a column for Black Image Magazine. She gives talks to local women's groups, mentors young doctors, and has served on the Susan B. Komen grant committee.
Two pivotal moments stand out in her career, she says. Once, during a hard day, a former patient walked into her office and enveloped her in a hug. “You saved my baby’s life!” the woman exclaimed. “You are the best doctor in the world!” A few months earlier, Dr. Mayes had successfully performed a procedure to help the woman’s baby breathe. Her words, Dr. Mayes says, reminded her why she does this challenging work.
Another time, a colleague of Dr. Mayes became suspicious that a patient was seeking drugs, even though the woman’s symptoms legitimately called for pain medicine and she had no history of ever misusing medication.
“When I walked in the room,” remembers Dr. Mayes, “I immediately knew what it was. There's a Black woman sitting on the exam table, with her mother and her two sisters there.” They were all distraught.
“We’re so glad it’s you, thank God!” they said.
Dr. Mayes read her chart and wrote the needed prescription. She also made it a teachable moment about racial bias for her colleague. “[The midwife] walked into a room of Black women, and she immediately felt threatened by it,” explains Dr. Mayes. “I talked to her about it and I said, ‘I really feel like this was on you and not on them.’”
“I’ve always felt it’s important to promote minorities to be in my field,” says Dr. Mayes. “But it never struck me until a few years ago how important it really is to have Black physicians treating Black patients. It’s about feeling comfortable and having someone to relate to. Maybe they open up more, maybe there’s more openness to what I’m suggesting that they do.”
Her daughter, a veterinarian, was also aware of the lack of teacher diversity in her veterinary school, with just one Black faculty member. Dr. Mayes encouraged her to become a professor and to pave the way for those behind her. “Then I said, ‘Wow, maybe I need to listen to my own words, and I need to be in academia.’”
So when a local medical school invited Dr. Mayes to join their faculty and teach medical residents, she accepted. “I’ve been in this city for twenty-eight years at the time, and I’ve never once seen a Black resident in the program [even though] there is a diverse population,” she says.
She teaches young people, including her two children, to advocate for themselves and to seize every available opportunity, including teachers’ office hours, wishing she'd done more of that as a student. "The schools you go to are there for you, to help you get to your next level. It’s okay to call people," says Dr. Mayes. "It doesn’t matter if it’s a faculty member or the dean. If they blow you off, just go to the next person. But you got to take that step. You need to go through that open door. You need to not be afraid.”