What a doctor looks like

   The hashtag #WhatADoctorLooksLike is sweeping the internet and with good reason.  In case you're not familiar with the story, I'll catch-you-up. Last week a man on a Delta airlines flight collapsed. So the flight attendant did what we've all watched in movies but few have seen in real life.  She asked if there was a doctor on board. A young African-American OBGYN (The kind of doctor that attends to women during pregnancy, pregnancy related issues and all other female-specific health issues) raised her hand because duh! She's a doctor. And even th The flight attendant saw her but automatically assumed she wanted to ask about something else, so she dismissed her and asked again for a doctor. She managed to get the attendant's attention again and this time informed her that she is a doctor.  So the unnecessary time-wasting and possible patient-killing Q & A ensued. Apparently the flight attendant was having a hard time believing that our young African-American woman is a doctor. She asked :
- What kind of doctor she is
-Where she practices
- Why she's on the flight in the first place
- If she had any documentation to prove that she is a doctor

Meanwhile, the man who'd collapsed still wasn't receiving any medical attention and those of us reading this story are having a hard time not pulling out our hairs because we know how crucial those few minutes after a person collapses can be. 

Before the flight attendant can continue her interrogation, an older Caucasian gentleman approaches her and also says that he's a doctor.  She immediately ushers him to the guy who'd collapsed without asking a single question. You can read the full story here.

   You might wonder why I'm sitting halfway around the world upset by this story. You might wonder how this is relevant to a Kenyan society where nearly all doctors are well,  black and so race isn't necessarily the issue for us.  Well let me tell you why.

   I'm upset because in sometimes doctors in Kenya are discriminated-against because of how they look. Patients who don't trust you because you look too young as opposed to the graying professor who's practiced medicine for 40 years and resembles their childhood memory of what a doctor should look like.  Never-mind the fact that there aren't enough graying professors  to treat everyone in the country. The young doctors are actually taught by the older professors and are taught pretty darn well. Never-mind that the reason the young docs are young is that this isn't the 60s where one went too school much later in life and occasionally had interruptions for years at a time in their education!

   Doctors in Kenya are discriminated against when female doctors meet male patients who either refuse to be treated by them,  or are hostile towards them. Or even female medical students. I have seen patients who go mum when clerked by a female but suddenly become very vocal when attended-to by a male colleague.Remind me again who loses out when you're sick and decide to be picky about your doctor's gender.

Or when patients assume that any female working in a hospital is automatically a nurse despite the fact that she's wearing a white coat. We all know that in this country doctors wear white coats while nursing staff wear distinct uniforms but apparently this logic isn't obvious to some. Never-mind that the same people have no qualms with identifying male healthcare workers wearing white coats as doctors... even when they aren't.  Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with nurses. They do incredible and amazing work and are valuable assets to healthcare as a whole. I have a problem with people repeatedly deciding what career options do and do not suit me because of my gender. The fact that it surprises when you meet a woman and she says she's a doctor tells you that there's something wrong with our mindsets. And you tend to raise your eyebrows and almost jump back in your surprise because the thought really hadn't crossed your mind.

   Last but not least, doctors in Kenya are discriminated-against because of their ethnicity. From counties that refuse to employ doctors from certain ethnic communities to people who 'prefer' doctors of certain ethnicities. As if ethnicity is directly proportional to medical expertise. And we could talk and talk about how this is one of the ways we are unknowingly tribalistic.. But that could take days.

We need to stop constructing glass ceilings over people's heads without consulting them. This is the same mentality with which we raise our children and decide for them that somethings are not for them. Telling them to stick to their lane. How do you know which lane is for you if you aren't the one driving? The truth is that anybody could be a doctor, engineer, artist, writer, chef or scientist. It's not up to you to decide!

Ciao...