Amsterdam: Hospital offers Ramadan counseling

A hospital at an immigrant-populated suburb of Amsterdam is offering counseling to its Muslim diabetic patients who want to observe the holy fasting month of Ramadan.


"We have 1,400 patients. Half are immigrants, of which 60 percent are Moroccan and the rest are from Turkey and Surinam," Eelco Meesters, head of the specialist diabetes unit at Slotervaartziekenhuis hospital, told Agence France Presse (AFP) on Tuesday, September 2.


Every year, the hospital, which lies in the Slotervaart suburb of Amsterdam which with a large Muslim population, calls its Muslim patients into the clinic a few days before the start of Ramadan to re-arrange the dosage.


"They come to change their course of medication or to ask for advice," said nurse Fatima Malki.


"We advise them to take light exercise or to have a walk after eating."


Malki, herself of Moroccan origin, said many patients are advised against fasting.


"We have to tell them it's not a good idea. We explain to them that there are verses of the Qur'an which allow very sick people to be excused from fasting."


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Source: Islam Online (English)

See also: UK: Pharmacy to offer Ramadan service

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