Looking for Light at the End of the Darkness
Looking for Light at the End of the Darkness
By Lubab Al-Quraishi, Refugee Congress Delegate for New Jersey
I am an international physician from Baghdad, Iraq, with a specialty in surgical pathology. Before coming to the U.S., I worked as a pathologist in Iraq for more than 10 years.
When I came to the U.S. as a refugee in 2014, I hoped I would be able to continue to pursue my career as a physician, a career I loved.
Unfortunately, that has been much more difficult than it should be.
Since arriving in the U.S., I have volunteered at many institutes to showcase my knowledge and experience, in hopes of getting a chance to resume my work as a pathologist, but I have never been considered for a position because I do not have a U.S. medical license.
Despite lacking this piece of paper, I have extensive experience in this field, and I want to help people using my training as a physician. After graduation in Iraq, I finished two years of a residency program in general medicine and surgery. Because I was in the top 10 students, I was offered an academic position to work as a demonstrator in the pathology department at the Baghdad Medical College. After that, I was matched in a four-year residency program in pathology.
I finished my residency program in 2006 and then worked as an assistant professor at Baghdad Medical College. In the mornings, I gave medical lectures for undergraduate and postgraduate students and supervised a lot of research work done by master’s and Ph.D. students, while in the evenings, I went to the hospital to offer service for women in an outpatient clinic called the Early Detection of Breast Cancer Clinic.
I published a lot of papers about breast cancers and female genital tract tumors in medical journals. In fact, today my colleagues and certain journals continue sending me their papers to revise and proofread.
In the U.S., this experience meant nothing. I could not work as a physician, so in order to pay my bills and afford a living for my kids and myself, I had to find work at a restaurant and a grocery store, and then at a CVS.
Finally, several years after arriving in the U.S., in 2017, I found a job offer as a pathologist assistant in New Jersey. My family and I decided to move from Texas to New Jersey so I could pursue this opportunity, although the pay would barely covering our expenses. I wouldn’t be working as a physician, but this would give me the chance to work closely with U.S.-licensed pathologists, so I jumped at the opportunity.
The U.S.-licensed pathologists were very impressed by my knowledge and experience and happy to have me helping them and making their job easier, and I was happy to be working back in the medical field, although I was frustrated that I could not do more.
In January 2019, I was able to get a New York state license as a pathologist assistant. I was working my way towards my dreams, but very slowly.
During the pandemic, my husband and I looked for any chance to support our community to fight against COVID and to say thank-you to the country that gave us a second chance to live in the security and peace that we lost in our country. We went to a temporary field hospital to volunteer, and then I volunteered to help test elderly people in the nursing homes in New York and New Jersey. I continue to do this now.
I believe that during this hard situation, we should forget about our differences and stand together to fight against this pandemic.
Then we received very good news! The governor signed an executive order to give a temporary license to international physicians so we could help with the fight against COVID. I was really happy about this, although it is temporary.
I think after the pandemic, the mindset should be changed and the regulations for the licensing of international physicians should be re-evaluated and updated to fit the needs of the nation, especially physicians like me who came with more than 10 years of experience in the medical field.
Currently, physicians like me have to go through a long process that includes a minimum of 3 years, 3 step exams and a four-year residency program, followed by a two-year fellowship, in order to be a licensed as a pathologist. I already did this training in my country and I was already practicing as a pathologist when I came here. Requiring me to do so again means years of lost time when I cannot be practicing in medicine and helping people. It is also incredibly difficult for refugees and immigrants to afford such a process when we are struggling to support our families in this new country.
A better approach, I think, would be for us to enroll in a two-year fellowship program in the same specialty under the supervision of a U.S.-licensed physicians, and then those U.S.-licensed physicians should be able to evaluate us and determine if we can work as doctors in the U.S. and serve our communities.
Want to Learn More & Take Action?
Learn more about medical licensing requirements from the American Physician Associates, Inc. - PHA Organization
View this policy map from WES and IMPRINT to see where there is proposed state legislation to advance updated licensing requirements
Contact your state representatives to ask that they propose or support legislation to make it possible for qualified foreign-trained physicians to work in the U.S.
Learn more about the Opportunities for New Americans Act sponsored by Representative Katko of New York, a bipartisan piece of legislation that would assess the skills and expertise that refugees and immigrants bring to the U.S. as well as the barriers preventing these professionals from re-entering their fields.
Lubab Al-Quraishi is the Refugee Congress Delegate for New Jersey. She is a physician with a medical degree and extensive professional experience in Iraq. She and her family came to the U.S. as refugees in 2014.
The opinions of Refugee Congress Members expressed in articles authored by them on the Refugee Congress Blog are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the entire organization.
