"Feeling Stigmatized by Patients": Religiosity, Ethnicity, and Cross-Gender Patient Interactions for a Male Muslim Physician

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Sitting in his office at the Women’s Health Clinic (WHC), Dr. Ahmad Rahal was deep in thought as he stared out of his office window at the budding blossoms on a nearby apple tree. The morning began at 7:30 a.m., and he had seen 16 patients by noon. The reason for their visits varied greatly: uterine fibroids, sexually transmitted infection (STI) tests, pap smears, urinary tract infections (UTI), and pelvic pain, to name a few. What also varied greatly were the patients’ backgrounds, and the encounters Ahmad had with each of them. Since the WHC was a free clinic, most of his patients did not have health insurance and were from different communities in the surrounding Fayetteville area. Ahmad saw women of varying races, ages, ethnicities, religions, and sexual orientations.