Enhancing health awareness and improving the quality of medical staff and facilities are essential to reduce the growing number of fatal medical errors in the Kingdom, Dr. Samia Al-Amoudi, deputy dean of the College of Medicine and Medical Sciences at King Abdulaziz University has said.

“Unfortunately medical errors have become a common phenomenon not only in Saudi Arabia but also in other countries. It is closely associated with a lack of public health awareness and poor quality of medical facilities,” she said in her first interview on the Twitter conducted by Khaled Aburas, a Saudi journalist.

Asked about her ordeal when she was afflicted by cancer, Dr. Al-Amoudi said: “By the grace and blessings of Allah, I was able to overcome that difficult period with perseverance. As a result, I was able to transform a test into a gift. I felt that it was a message of love from Allah to reduce my sins and increase my rewards.”

She advised cancer patients to deal with reality with a strong faith in Allah. Speaking about two major incidents that changed her life, she said: “The first was my pregnancy after a long time. The second was when I was hit by breast cancer.”

She said her father died when she was a small child and her mother and uncle had played a big role in providing her good education.

Asked how she was able to mix her medical profession with literary work, Al-Amoudi said: “Medicine and literature are closely linked. We can see many famous men of letters in the medical field. Medicine taught me to address humanity with kindness while literature helped me to pen my thoughts in a convincing and beautiful way.”

Al-Amoudi, who has met the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah, George Bush, Laura Bush, Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton, has authored 16 books including some on cancer. She is now working on two books: “My Story” and “Man in My Life.” Laura Bush launched a joint program to fight breast cancer in Saudi Arabia.

Al-Amoudi, a consultant obstetrician gynecologist, is the executive director of Al-Amoudi Center for Breast Cancer at KAU. She is also a member of the board of directors of the Geneva-based International Union Against Cancer, and a member of the Breast Cancer Committee at Harvard University.