"Delivering Health in a Changing World": American doctors in Turkey

Last weekend I attended a Medical Symposium held in Istanbul, which in my view is very important and deserves to be dwelt on at length. The National Arab American Medical Association (NAAMA), which operates in the US, chose to hold its annual meeting this year in Istanbul with a symposium lasting 5 days.

The association, founded in 1975, is a professional organization that acts as the voice of all Arab American health professionals and meets their professional and cultural needs. An integral member of all the official medical societies in America, the association carries out activities that improve the health and well-being of the communities where its members reside or from which they come.

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At the symposium, attended by nearly a hundred physicians from America, each a university faculty member or hospital practitioner in a different specialty, the experts over five days found the opportunity to present and discuss a large number of papers on current topics and developments in medicine and the problems of the medical profession.

In keeping with the tradition of providing state-of-the-art opportunities for interdisciplinary knowledge sharing and collaboration, the scientific theme chosen for this year's symposium was "Delivering Healthcare in a Changing World." This was seen as a fitting subject for the changing environment of health and healthcare delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Of course, since the symposium was in Istanbul, the level Türkiye has reached in health, and the potential it holds for delivering international medical services thanks to its solid infrastructure, also came up frequently. At this point, it was a matter that all participants appreciated and accepted that Türkiye's health system had drawn the attention of the whole world, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Earlier in this column I had mentioned several times that there is serious demand, even from the US and Europe, to work in the Turkish health system. For saying this I received reactions on social media, and to most of them, frankly, I conceded they were right, and I tried to state afterwards that I never ignored them.

In speaking of any advantage Türkiye has in health in this regard, the reality that in conscience we must absolutely not ignore is that the health system in Türkiye rests to a great extent on the self-sacrifice of health workers.

In the last 20 years a kind of health revolution has certainly taken place in Türkiye. But it has to be admitted that this revolution is a structure that, while largely targeting patient-citizen satisfaction, has not adequately rewarded health workers and has even wronged them compared with other professions.

Judged fairly, in my view health labor is the most toilsome, the most arduous of all kinds of labor, and yet the least rewarded. As I have said before on this subject, a balance of burden and pay must by all means be set up in a fairer way, somewhat in favor of health workers. It is sad that this imbalance leads many physicians to look for opportunities to work abroad, but before condemning wholesale those who enter this search, giving them a fair return is a far greater priority.

That said, when I say there is a segment that finds Türkiye more attractive to work in despite everything and is eager to work in Türkiye, those who find this exaggerated, even imaginary, are looking at everything only from what they themselves have lived or felt. Yet very different experiences can exist at the same time, and all of them need to be assessed together as a whole.

After the symposium, at the Haliç Congress Center, at the launch dinner organized by Medilife Hospital for a Health University that is to be established, again with the participation and support of American doctors, I had the chance to ask most of the association-member doctors we gathered with what they found, or hoped to find, in Türkiye. All of them said that they see Türkiye first and foremost as an important and model Islamic country and that they follow its health infrastructure and service performance closely and with appreciation. They expressed that they are proud that Türkiye, as an Islamic country, has been able to display such quality, and that they would be happy to contribute to it.

According to them, what makes Türkiye advantageous is especially the extraordinarily strong health infrastructure it has built recently and the fact that this is now recognized and known all over the world. In this respect Türkiye has become a very serious health tourism center. They see this and want to take part, in some way, in this aspect, which is growing ever stronger. But nearly all the association's members are Muslims, and although they earn very well in America, they see Türkiye as a place where, without breaking away from the West, they can lead their lives more easily and pass on Islamic values to their families.

The Association's National President, Dr. Imad Sabbagh, in his speech said that Istanbul gives very important inspirations and offers opportunities in the quest to deliver healthcare in a changing world, and added that he closely follows Türkiye's policies and practices in health.

What they see in health in Türkiye, as reflected in the words of the Association's previous president Dr. Imad Sbeeb and of the other speakers, is a view that also allows them to make a comparison between what they see in their own country and what they see in other countries in total.

What we see from the inside is, of course, along with this entire positive picture, the need for an urgent improvement in the situation of health workers.

When this issue is dwelt on a little more, what is clearly seen is that Türkiye is on its way to becoming a more lasting and far more productive world center in health.