Two weeks ago, I had an experience that every mother dreads. My daughter was hospitalized for five days with a viral infection. Saudis have several options when a loved one requires medical care: Government or private hospital or travel abroad for care in foreign country. The United States and England are often destinations for critical medical care.
As it was for our daughter, she required only intense intravenous antibiotics followed by oral medication. We chose the National Guard hospital and discovered following our initial apprehension that the physicians and nurses were extraordinary in their care and treatment. They are a model of proficiency, dedication and empathy. They calmed our fears.
To read media accounts in the Saudi press, there is a natural tendency for Saudis to be fearful of having their family members admitted to a government hospital. Horror stories run rampant. Our initial concern was not the treatment and perhaps not even the illness itself, but whether our daughter would be exposed to infection while staying as an inpatient.
Our fears were unfounded. Trained nurses, mostly from the Philippines and Malaysia, provided round-the-clock care, constantly taking our patient’s blood pressure and temperature and ensuring that our cycle of antibiotics was given at precisely the right time. Saudi nurses, mostly interns, matched the senior nurses in professionalism and care. A team of doctors from infection control and a surgeon were in constant consultation. We were also permitted a pass to allow our daughter to receive proper sleep in her own bed at home.
Linens were changed several times a day if we requested. The bathroom and room was cleaned several times a day. Every single individual entering the pediatric ward made liberal use of the hand sanitizers.
What made our stay at the hospital less than 100 percent were not the professionalism of the staff and the cleanliness of the facility — no, that bordered on perfectionism — but the hospital policy, indeed the rules of every government hospital in the country, was the pediatrics ward was a “women’s ward” that did not permit fathers’ access except during visiting hours.
Simply, fathers are denied access to their children because of “cultural” reasons to separate men and women. For cultural reasons fathers are basically not permitted to care for their children during the day or sleep beside them at night. The policy prevents them from providing comfort to their frightened and sick child, changing their diaper or taking them for a “walk” outside the ward. The gender separation policy, which may work well in restaurants and other public spaces, has no place in a hospital where fathers are a critical part of the recovery of their child. To be clear, the National Guard medical staff did everything in their power to allow my husband access to his daughter whenever he wanted it. Without acknowledging the ridiculous policy they, with the exception of one nurse, never denied him access to his daughter. Even more importantly, in a room that we shared with three other families, no Saudi mother raised a fuss that a man was visiting his sick daughter.
The pediatrics ward in the National Guard facility has no private rooms. While the staff worked with us, such arcane gender separation policies in a hospital environment must be revisited. Fathers today are much more involved in their children’s upbringing and to deny them share the parenting responsibilities with the mother based on “culture” is a weak argument.
