Saeed Al-Khotani Saudi Gazette MINA — Sara Al-Shaye, 29, a Saudi information technology engineer based in Riyadh, came for the first time to serve in Haj, with a team of Saudi female IT specialists in a pilot IT project that the Ministry of Health implemented in five primary healthcare centers in Mina. “When I was offered the job I was given the choice, but I decided to go, especially because of the encouragement of my husband,” she told Saudi Gazette on her experience as a Saudi female serving in Haj. “Once I arrived here, I was strongly moved with the sight of the giant crowds of devotees of varying ages who came from all over the world to seek the forgiveness of Allah through the most physically taxing religious ritual,” she said. “The project I worked on was to install a system for the use of digital pens aimed at collecting patient data,” she added. “The purpose of collecting this data was to generate as much accurate, reliable and thorough information as possible for planning and development of healthcare services provided to pilgrims at primary healthcare centers in the holy sites. Each pen can store the data of around 1,000 patients,” she pointed out. Sara's job falls in the category of non-traditional jobs held by Saudi females in healthcare settings in Haj. Saudi women traditionally worked in Haj as nurses and, to a less extent, physicians. This year around 1,625 females served as nurses, according to the Assistant Deputy Health Minister for Support Medical Services, Dr. Munira Al-Osaimi. “This figure represents 28 percent of a total of 5,900 male and female nurses, and 75 percent of all Saudi nurses, mobilized to provide healthcare services to pilgrims,” she said. Deputy Health Minister for Planning and Development Dr. Muhammad Khushaim said: “In previous years, we used to recruit nurses from Egypt and Malaysia, but this year we stopped that and relied on Saudi and local nurse recruitment,” he said. Suzan Kabawi, 33, deputy head of nursing services at Mina Emergency Hospital, said when she started working as a nurse in the hospital, Saudi nurses represented just 10 percent. “But now things have changed and we see plenty of them around here serving in Haj.” Saudi Gazette met some Saudi nurses who were serving for the first time in Haj to learn about their experience in serving pilgrims. Hila Al-Saeedi, 26, said she participated in the service by her own will and the encouragement of her colleagues who had served in previous years. Also, her husband encouraged her to participate. “It was an extremely wonderful experience. I felt a push from within which kept reminding me that what I was doing was serving the guests of Allah and not merely doing a job,” she said. Sana Ghulman, 32, a full-time student and a nurse at King Faisal Specialist Hospital, said: “My sister suggested that I join the Haj service in the hospital. It sounded appealing, so I joined as a volunteer.”
