How much do appearances matter to us? We must admit that we give far too much attention to outward appearances and far too little to the substance that should be behind them.
Reading a newspaper report on decisions recently taken by the Ministry of Health, I found myself remembering some old Arabic proverbs describing people who are masters of appearance but consistently ignore the substance of things. The ministry has apparently decided that all is well as far as the practice of medicine is concerned, so concentration can be shifted to what medical staff wear.
Directives describing what female medical staff should wear were in the newspapers a few days ago. Coats are to be worn though colors will differ according to rank and job. Nurses are to wear one color while doctors will wear another. Tight trousers are not allowed and neither are makeup and accessories.
Well, if the ministry thinks that appearance is important, most of us do too. It is perfectly right to expect professionals to look professional. That said, one has to be suspicious about where these rules are leading and why they were made in the first place. A doctor wearing jeans and makeup who is doing her job conscientiously is surely more appreciated by patients than one who is dressed according to the rules but who is careless and lacking in empathy. We read with distressing regularity about mistakes that occur in our hospitals — many of them fatal — but no guidelines were issued to address those issues.
Some Jeddah hospitals complain of a lack of medicine and some even have to ask for donations from companies and rich people in order to buy medicine. One hospital in Jeddah has been working for the past two months with no phone lines; people cannot contact doctors and patients cannot contact their relatives. Some hospitals complain of a lack of beds and have to turn away those who need hospitalization. And this is without mentioning hospitals with inadequate — or no — water, air-conditioning, staff or medical equipment. Obviously these hospitals need solutions to their problems; the solutions would be far more welcome than directives about how staff should dress. We are only too well aware of hospitals that emphasize luxurious foyers and entrances with extravagant marbled rooms and corridors; those same hospitals, however, often lack what makes a hospital worthy of peoples’ trust: good care and conscientious service. Both the public and the private sector seem to have come together in caring more about trivial matters than about matters of real substance. Wouldn’t it be welcome to hear that studies were being done to make health care services and hospitals more efficient?
