A Real Story

The pager started ringing and the doctor looked at the caller ID to see that it was his home phone number followed by 99; the code on which he agreed with his wife to indicate emergency. The doctor knew an accident happened; he started praying to God for mercy as he dialed his home phone number. As he expected, an accident happened in his house: His 4-year-old son had a concussion.

 

The doctor was still in his clinic, which is more than 40 miles away from his house. His wife was terrified as blood covered her child’s face. The doctor asked his wife to call 911, hung up and dialed 911 as well. He left his office in a hurry and in less than 5 minutes he was in his car. He called his wife again and she told him that 3 firemen and 3 paramedics arrived to their house, they performed first aid and put bandages on the child’s head and the bleeding had stopped, adding that the child was about to be taken to the children’s hospital. In 20 minutes, the doctor (the child’s father) arrived at the emergency room at the children’s hospital, where the ER crew was cleaning the wound to start sewing it.

 

Within an hour, the child went home accompanied by his parents.

 

This was not an imaginary story; it was a real story that happened to a doctor in Boston, USA without any exaggerations or additions. The wife told her husband that the 911 operator stayed on the line with her, giving her the necessary medical directions until the paramedics arrived and she made sure the child was safe.

 

It is funny and sad at the same time that the doctor did not find any American who was blown away after hearing the story, as all the details were expected and did not surpass the care and quality of medical services that they were used to. In fact, none of them expected less than that, as they consider it one of their rights. On the contrary, the same story receives a lot of applaud, admiration and even surprise from Arabs, including doctors, thinking that it includes a lot of exaggeration; they were not used to that and were not familiar with the fact that it is one of the rights of the human being.

 

Do you think there is anything on earth that is more valuable and precious than the human life, which carries a divine scent?  “And when I have proportioned him and breathed into him of My [created] soul, then fall down to him in prostration.” And do you think it is a waste of money and energy for 6 first aid workers to arrive in less than 5 minutes at the location of an accident where a child had a concussion? This is nothing compared to some tragic accidents that happen in our countries every day, taking away lives before they receive any aid until it is too late. Some will say that it is just fate, forgetting that being prepared is part of fate, as the Caliph Omar Bin Al-Khattab (may God be pleased with him) said “ We run away from God’s fate to God’s fate” when he refused to enter the then-plagued Levant and Abu Obaidah Bin Al-Jarrah told him “An escape from God’s fate?” Omar said “If only someone else other than you said it, Abu Obaidah! Yes, we escape from God’s fate to God’s fate, you see if you had camels and they went down grazing into a valley with two sides, one of which was fertile and the other was barren, if you grazed them on the fertile side, it would be by the decree of Allah, and if you grazed them on the barren side, it would be by the decree of Allah.”

 

We are the guardians of human life; we who were given the honor of practicing medicine by God, which is a great mission that should not be neglected. One person might die as a result of our negligence, causing us to receive God’s wrath, or one person could be saved by God’s will and our preparation and taking the right measures to bring us God’s bless “And whoever saves one soul, it is as if he had saved mankind entirely.”