"There should not be any problem with being a Roma and being a doctor..."
Photo: Petruț CălinescuThere should not be any problem with being a Roma and being a doctor. To be a Roma doctor does not seem to me to be a success. I don’t want to be appreciated for this, but for my professional achievements, for what I am working on as a doctor. I want to prove that I am a good Roma doctor for both kinds of patients: Roma and non-Roma. I have adapted to the environment of the Romanian majority, but I’m still living in my world, the small world of Roma.
In the 12th grade my brother had a dangerous car accident. He was seriously hurt. He stayed for almost two months in hospital and six months at home. That was the first time when I believed I could study medicine. I prepared all by myself, I tried to learn alone, and I bought a book with entrance exams. I finished high school in pedagogy [theory of education], which had nothing to do with what I wanted to study, because it wasn’t centered on biology and chemistry - the basic subjects for an entrance exam for medical school. But I was determined to succeed, so I registered and a little later found out that I passed the exam. I was ambitious enough to stay and to continue my studies at medical school, and from one year to another I was more motivated to learn, not for the grades, but because I would work with people. Surgery is the most interesting discipline for me, I live for it, and it gives me a huge satisfaction. I really love it, but it is also really hard. Grants helped me financially to continue my studies, otherwise it would have been impossible to support myself. To develop yourself, you have to invest in courses, books and textbooks, which are pretty expensive. At first, my parents were in despair. Although they were happy, they thought it was an expensive university and I would not be able to support myself. My mother is a housewife with five children, including me, and my father was working as a truck driver, but he had a serious illness, needed an operation and he couldn’t work anymore. Sometimes I did not have enough money to leave for university and to come home. From one year to another it was difficult and I had to study really hard, because I had chosen a complex specialism. Moreover, my elder sister tried to gain entrance to a medical school, but she could not pass the exam. She graduated in Journalism and worked in television for a year, but realized that she didn’t like it. I was already in my third year of study and I encouraged her to try again for a medical faculty. I helped her and she did it, and is now, at 29, in her sixth year of study. What I discovered in hospital about the perception of Roma and all those prejudices amazed and disappointed me at the same time. Most of the staff had problems with Roma patients and they had some prejudices. But step by step, I feel they will change their opinion, and this is what I want. Regarding me, my colleagues already perceive me differently. It’s tough to survive as a Roma within a majority of Romanians, especially in this domain. But I showed them that being Roma doesn’t mean I am dirty, a thief or stupid. I would like to do something to end discrimination in emergency hospitals, where Roma patients are often the last to be treated. I would accept all Roma patients who are rejected by other doctors. Different regimes for patients should not exist.
I am at a point where I think that the biggest discrimination against the Roma is happening in hospitals and most of the time I hear an illogical explanation: ‘Roma people don’t understand the treatment they should take and if they have any complications unrelated to treatment, they blame the doctor and develop tense relations with doctors’, or ‘Roma people don’t understand, they overreact and they are mischievous’. Many times over I helped doctors get on peacefully with Roma patients. I had Roma patients and I helped them to get on with the main doctor responsible for their situation, and patients trusted me even if I was just a resident doctor. If the doctor told them to take a treatment, they were waiting for my approval. Once some Roma people called “caldarari” came and I worked with them really well. I don’t know if doctors are able to understand some traditions. There were situations when Roma women came to hospital and didn’t want to undress in front of the doctor because it was a man, and the doctors were getting impatient. I never tried to hide that I am a Roma woman and I won’t try to do that ever. I sincerely regret that I didn’t wear my traditional clothes on the first day. I believe that the medical system has plenty of Roma doctors who don’t admit their ethnicity because of the work culture. I didn’t live in a community, but I learned the Romani language at school, and I speak Romani with patients and they can’t believe it. I would like to support Roma to build some honorable careers. It’s tough to be Roma woman in this work area because you have to fight all the time. I always have to prepare myself and to prove that we are normal people. I think that most people call me a gypsy and can’t get over that first impression. I have no right to make mistakes because I could be targeted as a person who confirmed the stereotype. It is a continual fight and I hope that God will help me become what I want. I’m sure that things will change in hospitals. I want to obtain a PHD and to become a professor, why not? But it’s a long way to that point.
I am thinking of studying abroad for my specialism and after that to come back to do something here. I have to improve my medical English. During university, I obtained an Erasmus-Socrates Scholarship, and I studied for one semester in Spain, at the Medical University in Valladolid.
When I was a little girl, I wanted to study law and become an Ombudsman. What stopped me from this was that, in order to make money, I would have to lie. I didn’t like that. Usually, children learn at home that ‘’gypsies are bad”, “gypsies steal” and probably this is a reason for the distance between me and the other kids. They often told me: ‘’Where do you think you are? In your slum?” A teacher told me that people were under my intelligence level if they resorted to offending me, rather than coming up with an argument. But I don’t generalize. My desk mate was Romanian, the daughter of the principal, who finished his Master’s at Cambridge, and she was my best friend. It depends very much on education, and what parents teach their children until they are old enough to see the differences. In high-school, people didn’t have this view, and they called me the “little gypsy” with affection. I didn’t feel any kind of discrimination while I was an undergraduate and I never hid my ethnicity. My colleagues were surprised and really curious about our traditions, about my family and how I managed to succeed.
I work with people who are from another level, we collaborate and I don’t feel any distance; on the contrary they are people who want to help me progress. I had a patient who was a “caldarar”. We operated on him in our hospital and he came with all his family, with grandparents, brothers, sisters. And I really liked that they listened to me and trusted me and gave me the chance to trust myself. I told them about my brother’s accident, and how my whole family accompanied him to the hospital. We were extremely concerned. I was 18 years old at that time and I wanted much more from doctors because my wish was to see my brother get better as soon as possible. I thought that he could have been better cared for. The other doctors are more relaxed now when they have to deal with Roma patients. Another time they would have imagined that Roma are aggressive, even if they were just worried for their loved ones. That’s the point. Generally, the patient doesn’t have any medical knowledge and his family doesn’t understand that the doctor tried his best, and from this point problems can appear. In Roma communities, there should be training and discussions about some basic medical issues. Most members of these communities are disappointed and don’t know they have rights. I’m glad to show that we, the Roma, aren’t just some chess pieces who can be moved around by the desire of the majority. I’m sorry that I can’t do more about this, but for now I’m too young. All this negativism determined me to fight. I don’t want to give up. Here I found myself, I feel that here is my purpose - for good and bad.
