BREAKING with tradition by talking openly as a Saudi woman about her experience with breast cancer resulted in Dr. Samia Al-Amoudi being ranked fifth among the top 100 women who have had a positive impact on their societies as well as the most courageous woman in Saudi Arabia and one of the eight most courageous women in the world. As a well-known obstetrician-gynecologist, when Al-Amoudi discovered a lump in her breast in April 2006, she knew what she could be facing. “As soon as I felt the lump, my medical instincts were immediately awakened telling me that this was a tumor. I immediately thought of my two children and of how I could prepare them psychologically to deal with sickness and death,” she said. Al-Amoudi, who accepted that she had been chosen by God to be sick, had no fear of pain or death and instead chose to focus on enlightening people about breast cancer. “I called my sickness a message of love because there is a reason for everything. I felt that I was chosen by God to be sick for a reason, especially as I was already interested in informing the public about medical issues even before I discovered that I had cancer,” she said. “From the moment I learned that I was sick, I chose not to hide my experience but to share it with others through a column I used to write in Al-Madina newspaper,” she explained. At a time when Saudi society did not speak openly of potentially fatal diseases, Al-Amoudi shared with the readers of the newspaper every aspect of her disease, including how she discovered her tumor, how she broke the news to her children, what it felt like to lose her hair during chemotherapy and what her most frightening moments were. “Not everyone approved of the openness with which I spoke about my disease, but I did it to prove that not every cancer patient is going to die unless the tumor is diagnosed late. Early diagnosis can help in the treatment of the disease,” she explained. Al-Amoudi was also faced with conveying the same message to her two young children, Abdullah in intermediate school and Israa, an elementary school student. “I wanted them to understand that not every cancer patient dies and that we have improved treatment these days. This was hard for me to do since I was playing the role of mother and father at the same time,” she said. Al-Amoudi received a call from the US Consulate saying that they were following her column and wanted her to be a part of the US-Middle East Partnership for Breast Cancer Awareness and Research. “It was then that I realized that my column was not only a way of sharing my experience, it was also a way of warning Saudi society of the need for early and regular checkups,” she said. In 2007 she met Laura Bush, the wife of former president George Bush, when she visited Saudi Arabia during a four-nation trip to the Middle East to promote the US-Middle East Partnership for Breast Cancer Awareness and Research, and later that year, Al-Amoudi was presented with the International Woman of Courage Award in Washington, D.C. in recognition of her pioneering work in promoting breast cancer awareness, prevention and treatment in Saudi Arabia. In November of that year, Al-Amoudi was honored by the Faculty of Medicine at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, as well as the Society for the Promotion of Health, the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (women's section). Her story was included in the English language curriculum of boys and girls secondary schools, and “Breaking the Silence”, a documentary film of her fight against breast cancer was produced in Arabic and English. With the help of her children, Al-Amoudi published several books about breast cancer addressed to different age groups, such as her book “Break the Silence”, her daughter Israa ‘s first awareness children's book “My Mother and Breast Cancer” and her son Abdullah's book entitled “Cancer by the Son”. There are no exact statistics in the Kingdom about the number of breast cancer patients, as many cases are not diagnosed until the late stages of the disease and patients die without ever knowing what the cause of death was, Al-Amoudi said. “There is a misconception in society, and many women prefer not to know about the disease and are reluctant to fight it,” she added. Al-Amoudi graduated in 1981 among the first batch of students from the Faculty of Medicine of King Abdulaziz University, and is currently involved in a number of breast cancer awareness organizations. She is president of the Sheikh Mohammed Hussain Al-Amoudi Center of Excellence in Breast Cancer. “The center fights breast cancer in Saudi Arabia by promoting an early detection strategy and promoting multidisciplinary breast cancer care,” she explained. It raises women's awareness of their health rights in Islam, ensures their access to breast-screening services, educates men and religious and cultural authorities about breast cancer, and uses school curricula to increase breast cancer awareness.
