Islamic Medicine Or Medical Quackery? I

During my days as a house officer in the department of obstetrics gynecology, a woman presented to the delivery ward with obstructed labour. She was previously scheduled for an elective C.S., but defaulted and stayed at home instead.

The reason? Her pastor had prayed for her and advised her to deliver her baby herself like the historical Hebrew women. That it was 'not her portion' to go under the knife to have her baby. She was given olive oil to rub on her belly and scriptures to recite.

Three days of feverish prayer and intense labour pains later, the woman presented to the hospital barely conscious. We had to do the C.S to remove a dead baby.

While discussing with my colleagues, they flooded me with stories of how pastors conduct deliveries in churches and the many ways in which they interfered with the health of their followers.

In my foolish mind, I thought to myself- this can never happen in Islam.

Fast forward a few later, I find myself practicing in Kano witnessing a different kind of drama.

A young woman presents to the labour room and the nurse on duty examines her. Two centimeters, she says. There is still time. The nurse goes on to attend to other patients when suddenly two hours later, the woman lets out a blood curling scream. The baby is coming, she says.

How come? From 2cm to full dilatation in under two hours? The nurse hurriedly checks the woman and confirms that indeed, the baby's head is visible. Before she can prepare the birthing materials, the baby starts coming out causing the woman to tear. All the nurses and doctors abandon other patients to deliver the baby safely.

Baby is fine, but mother is bleeding due to third degree perineal tears please google it.

After arresting the bleeding and stitching the woman up, we have a small meeting to discuss the case. Where did we go wrong? How did the woman have precipitated labour? The woman did not even have an IV line when she delivered, so oxytocin was out of the question.

The poor woman confirmed that she was not given any medication. An experienced elderly matron among us took it upon herself to further interrogate the woman. She had seen similar cases in the past.

The woman confessed that the only thing she was drinking consistently was her 'Rubutu' holy water. Give it to me, she asked. The new mother handed over half a bottle of darkish liquid to the nurse, who promptly sent it the drug and compounding unit.

Results came out the next day. The liquid contained high doses of Misprostol. For those who don't know, Misoprostol is a synthetic prostaglandin medication that causes uterine contraction and is therefore used to induce labour and to cause an abortions.

Apparently, the mallam had made a business of giving the 'Rubutu' in exchange for charity. Afterall, Mallam cannot be seen to be selling merchandise for worldly profit. The 'Rubutu is meant to hasten labour and make the whole experience easier.

Let me briefly explain how labour works. Labour is the gradual dilatation opening and effacement of the cervix mouth of the womb. It is a gradual process that takes time to occur.

Usually, the cervix opens about 1 to 1.5cm every hour. Therefore, the nurse was right when she assumed that it would be several hours before the woman reached full dilatation 10cm.

So, in essence, the 'mallam' had dubiously washed written Quranic words with high doses of misoprostol, sold it to unsuspecting women with the guise that it would hasten their labour, instead of waiting for nature to run its course, and had instead caused a young woman to tear her vagina all the way to her anus because of the severe contraction of the uterus against a cervix that was not yet ready for delivery.

That day, I was baptized into the medical quackery neatly disguised as 'Islamic Medicine'.

Nowadays everywhere you turn, either on mighty billboards or on TV commercials, men both young and old have packaged themselves into some kind of modern day Babalawo. They have successfully fused religion into their traditional concoctions and given it the term 'Islamic medicine'.

Giant billboards of young men in different poses and makeup, showing off wristwatches and rings, staring back at people are all over Kano. They claim to have cures for hypertension, diabetes, stroke and, of course, erectile dysfunction.

And just like that, years and years of health education and advocacy are washed down the drain.

Patients on antidiabetic medication for years have abandoned their drugs, fallen into diabetic coma, and died because some mallam gave them a concoction with honey.

Men with prostate cancer have decided not to have surgery because one Islamic chemist has told them it is 'Sanyi' and can be cured using herbs that the prophe