An American
Muslim Hospital
By Dr Mahjabeen Islam
Toledo, Ohio
Just as it is downright stupid for Iranian president
Ahmedinejad to wish away Israel, it is fantasy
to think that America’s six to eight million
Muslims will convert, simultaneously die or at
the minimum, magically disappear. With a total
of 1.5 billion across the world, one can understand
how overwhelming and coming-out-of-the-woodwork
we seem to the non-Muslim.
Muslims born in America have ingrained ties; even
those of us who are first-generation immigrants
have a sense of identity and a deep love for this
land. The first wave of Muslim immigration came
to America as slaves and soon lost their religious
identity to that of their masters. The second
wave brought blue-collar workers from the Arab
world and Europe and the third wave brought the
highly educated from South Asia. We are all done
now with getting ourselves the good life, replete
with wealth and status.
Mosques dot the American landscape from sea to
shining sea. Travel down Interstate 75, from Ohio
to Florida is like an architectural trek of mosques.
The Turkish architecture of the Islamic Center
of Greater Toledo, whose minarets kids call “rockets,”
sits flush with the freeway. A few hours south,
a bend on the highway and the stately Cincinnati
mosque greets you. Many mosques have full-time
Islamic schools and almost all have weekend schools.
Just as I was getting tired of seeing invariably
non-Muslim donor names on doors, rooms and auditoriums
of hospitals, we have the advent of Sara and Sohaib
Abbasi who have donated five million dollars for
an Islamic Chair at Stanford and for computer
sciences at the University of Illinois.
But it was 2 a.m. on Tues Dec 13 that I think
my life changed. Though breakfast with the New
York Times classifies as a major treat for me,
I am also like Charlie Brown: I hate mornings.
The treat can only happen on a weekend anyway.
So late that night, sleepless post extra-brewed
Earl Grey, a news item in the New York Times snagged
my attention. Saudi prince and businessman, Prince
Alwaleed bin Talal bin Abdulaziz Alsaud, fifth
on Forbes’ 400 list of the wealthiest in
the world, had donated $20 million to Harvard
and Georgetown University. The Harvard donation
was for Islamic Studies and the Georgetown one
for promoting Christian-Muslim understanding.
It suddenly occurred to me that the American-Muslim
community needs to build hospitals across America.
There are numerous Catholic, Presbyterian, Lutheran
and Jewish hospitals. Not a single one is Muslim.
Muslims cannot be part of the melting pot of America
for our culture precludes formless integration.
Being part of the American mosaic is the paradigm:
distinct and yet part of the whole.
APPNA, or the Association of Pakistani Physicians
of North America, has 3000 members, but there
are about 8000 physicians of Pakistani descent
in N. America. I put the idea on the APPNA listserv
and suddenly it is not the driftings of an insomniac
anymore. The interest is overwhelming and plans
have begun. A vote for the name seems to indicate
that it will be called AIMC, or American-Islamic
Medical Center.
A very pertinent question showed up on the listserv:
why an American Muslim hospital? To me this institution
will underscore and in a sense ratify the Muslim
presence in America. Muslims in America are a
minority but they are 6-8 million strong and they
are about everywhere: the on-call list of 15 doctors
in my hospital had nine Muslim names. And yet
(thank you Osama) we are the lepers that people
wish would disintegrate somehow.
I wrote on the list: “For myself I will
say that the idea is amazing to me because I want
to prove to myself and America that Muslims are
part and parcel of America, that we are intrinsic
to it, not some alien transients. That this country
runs not on Judeo-Christian but Judeo-Christian-Islamic
values. I want us to give back to the community,
to prove to ourselves and the world that we are
not these wealthy self-absorbed people, that we
do have philanthropy in us, in fact it is enshrined
as zakat in our faith.”
Obviously all patients will be treated, and all
employed, regardless of race, religion or gender.
For-profit or non-profit status will be decided
by the Board of Trustees. The care of Muslim patients
remains a bit of a mystery, even a challenge to
the medical field in America. Perhaps the American
Muslim hospital will have an Ethics department
that can be looked to for providing solutions
and educating non-Muslim professionals in regard
to this.
We plan a state-of-the-art facility not one run
by volunteers. The idea is to get the crème
de la crème in all areas, from architects
to CEOs. Only the Board of Trustees would need
to have a good representation of Muslims so that
the mission of the hospital and its Muslim focus
is continued. A certain percentage of care will
be provided on a charitable basis, but the primary
idea is a hospital administered by Muslims, with
a keen eye on financial solvency.
Inshaallah with the success of one hospital, for
instance the American-Islamic Medical Center of
Chicago, we would be in the position to clone
it in other cities, after feasibility is determined.
Eventually a medical school and nursing homes
can be envisaged.
There is no intention to facilitate employment
for Muslim physicians or potential residents or
provide total charitable care. Being at the receiving
end of xenophobia and persecution, we plan to
operate on a totally integrated, race and religion-blind
perspective. To ensure success, perhaps the model
simply stated would be a hospital based on a strong
spiritual and a sharp business basis.
Many Muslims, especially Muslim physicians and
businessmen are in the highest income echelon
in this land. We are the followers of a faith
that teaches discipline and punctuality on a daily
basis. Get a bird’s-eye-view of prayer at
any mosque - the symmetry of the rows and the
unison of motion make me proud to be part of this
magnificent faith.
We must break the tradition that Muslims are the
tardiest, for when it is necessary, we show up
ahead of time! We have all the ingredients for
the creation of an American Muslim hospital: the
vision, the passion, the money, the diligence,
the commitment and most of all we are practitioners
of a faith that keeps good deeds as the passport
for eternal bliss. For the religiously inclined
donation or participation would be sadqa-e-jaria;
a marvelous spiritual legacy that multiplies even
after death.
The listserv is abuzz with ideas and plans. Some
doctors say they are real excited about it and
write the word with a capital E. One of them wrote,
“I have never been so excited since the
Olympic Hockey Gold Medal for Pakistan 1984 in
LA”
The idea is so encompassing that it reminds me
of being in love, it seems to be all that I can
think about. The Ohio winter this year is already
severe, but I don’t seem to notice the snow.
SADD, or seasonal affective depressive disorder
gets me in the winter; I am strangely rather cheerful
now. The office parking lot is a veritable skating
rink, threatening a hip fracture in seconds; used
to make me inwardly swear at the lazy landlord,
but now I reflect on the euphemism of “black
ice”.
The building of an American-Muslim hospital may
begin the start of an Islamic renaissance, even
more interestingly, from the West. I know this
can be labeled as grandiose ideation. Even more
interestingly contempt and skepticism slide off,
for my dream of building the hospital, I know,
will come true. If it revives Islamic culture
and civilization, I will about die with joy.
(Mahjabeen Islam is a physician and freelance
columnist practicing in Toledo Ohio. Her email
is mahjabeenislam@hotmail.com)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
