April is Arab American Heritage Month, a time to celebrate the many contributions Arab Americans have made to U.S. history and culture and to learn more about Arab American heritage. For Sumayah Abed, M.D., assistant professor in UAB’s Department of Family and Community Medicine, the month offers an occasion to reflect on her own journey and on the contributions Arab Americans have made to medicine.
Abed, who was born in Iraq, practiced medicine in several countries in the Middle East before emigrating to the U.S. with her husband. She now practices at the UAB Hoover Family Medicine Clinic, treating both adult and pediatric patients and particularly expanding the department’s focus and expertise in women’s health care. She is also a faculty advisor and diversity liaison for the department.
Abed treats many Arab American patients and recently used her own time to translate important medical documents into Arabic so that Arabic-speaking patients can better understand their diagnoses and what they need to do to stay healthy. These translated documents are now available to all UAB providers.
Sumayah Abed, M.D.
Reflecting this month, Abed shared an article written by Ahmed Asfari, M.D., assistant professor in the UAB Division of Pediatric Cardiology. In the piece, Asfari discusses Arab American identity and Arab and Arab Americans’ contributions to medicine beginning centuries ago, including research advancements and innovations in the delivery of care, such as divisions of “outpatient” and “inpatient” medicine, in-hospital pharmacies and in-hospital training programs.
“As we celebrate the month of April as Arab American Heritage Month, I echo Dr. Asfari’s article about the role played by Arab Americans in the last two centuries, not only in the health care but in all aspects of life in the U.S.,” Abed said. “UAB is an example of organization that has a large number of academic and clinical health staff of Arabic descent who have greatly contributed to the progress of the institution. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of Arab American physicians worked on the frontlines here at UAB and nationwide.”
Abed, of course, is among those on the frontlines. Currently, she is also involved in UAB’s Post-COVID Treatment Program, seeking to help patients experiencing lingering COVID-19 symptoms.
Looking back at COVID and beyond, Abed is proud of the work she and her UAB colleagues have done, particularly when it comes to reaching underserved populations.
“I am proud to be a part of UAB, which helps me serve the diverse population of Birmingham and the state of Alabama,” she said. “Being an Arabic-speaking physician has allowed me to have efficient communication with patients speaking Arabic. I have also been able to build a repository of educational materials for the common clinical conditions in Arabic that can be used by clinicians at UAB. Given my background of working in different countries overseas, I enjoy working in an ethnically and culturally diverse community like Birmingham and to serve the underprivileged population here.”
She and Asfari both point out that a lack of documentation, including when Arab Americans are classified as white in some data, can make recognizing and serving that population more difficult.
“The lack of proper documentation of Arab Americans as they are classified as White making it difficult to estimate their contribution to the society including the health care system in the US.,” Abed said. “As a minority, Arab Americans are exceeding 3.5 million and they share ethnically common health needs”