Rufaida, the First Muslim Nurse

[MuslimDoc]

I would like to shed the light on the professional nursing life of the first nurse and social worker in Islam who was a female and her name was Nurse Rufaidah bint Sa'ad.

Nurse Rufaidah started her profession with the emergence of the first Islamic state in the time of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH- stands for Peace Be Upon Him). Nurse Rufaidah was not only a nurse, but also a social worker as well. She urged nurses to correlate with their own societies and raise health campaigns in order to prevent their societies from the risks of illness and sickness; “She was involved in social work in the community.

She came to the assistance of every Muslim in need: the poor, the orphans, or the handicapped. She looked after the orphans, nursed them, and taught them.” “She was kind and empathetic. She was a capable leader and organizer able to mobilize and get others to produce good work. She had clinical skills that she shared with the other nurses whom she trained and worked with. She did not
confine her nursing to the clinical situation. She went out to the community and tried to solve the social problems that lead to disease.

She was a public health nurse and a social worker. Rufaidah is an inspiration for the nursing profession in the Muslim world”.

Muslim nurses from the early days of Islam had understood the importance of training and recruitment programs in their profession. They used to conduct training programs in their societies and assign new trainees with suitable jobs. These programs over the years provided the Muslim societies with innumerable devoted nurses who led to the emergence of hospitals in Islam which were the centers for nursing patients, conducting education, training programs and developing new medicines and nursing methods which left indelible shiny marks on the world’s nursing profession.

“Rufaidah's father was a physician. She learned medical care by working as his assistant. Her history illustrates all the attributes expected of a good nurse.
“When the Islamic state was well established in Madina, Rufaidah devoted herself to nursing the Muslim sick.”

“Rufaidah had a kind and empathetic personality that soothed the patients in addition to the medical care that she provided. The human touch is a very important aspect of nursing that is unfortunately being forgotten as the balance between the human touch and technology in nursing is increasingly tilted in favor of technology.”
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