Badriya Al-Lenjawi

Badriya Abdullah Al-Lenjawi is Executive Director of Nursing at Hamad Medical Corporation and a nursing researcher.

At every stage of her life and career, she sought to become a better nurse and a more effective citizen in the service of her community and country. In doing so, she fulfilled both her own ambition and her father’s dream.

She grew up in a conservative, traditional Qatari family and remembers a happy childhood shaped by close parental care. Her family supported her early dreams and nurtured her passion. When playing with her siblings, she would assume the role of a nurse and examine them with a stethoscope. Her father joined the game as her patient, encouraging her enthusiasm for the profession she would later enter.

Her first experience of independence came at fourteen, when she travelled with a group of Qatari girls to the Republic of Ireland to learn English. The journey taught her more than a language: it required responsibility and self-reliance, accelerated her maturity and strengthened the confidence her father had placed in her.

She completed primary and preparatory education at Fatima Al-Zahra School in Msheireb, then joined the Technical Secondary School for Nursing. Her father encouraged her not to stop with that qualification but to complete general secondary education at the same time. She studied nursing in the morning and attended Hafsa Secondary School in the evening. Through disciplined time management, hard work and her father’s support, she graduated from both and received the two certificates together, opening new possibilities and increasing her determination to succeed.

Her graduation coincided with the opening of Hamad Hospital in 1982. The hospital contacted the graduates, and she began her first position in the Intensive Care Unit, specifically in cardiology. It was the work she had hoped for. She remained in the department for three years before travelling to Bahrain to complete a bachelor’s degree in nursing.

After returning from Bahrain, she was promoted first to Assistant Head of Department and then to Head of Cardiology, a position she held for eight years. Her ambition continued to grow, and she travelled again to pursue a master’s degree in the United States, which she completed in 1996. The qualification led to another promotion, this time overseeing the hospital’s inpatient departments. By 1998, she carried responsibility across the hospital while also serving as Assistant Executive Director of Hamad General Hospital. Despite the progress she had made, she left again in 2003 to pursue a doctorate. On returning in 2010, she assumed overall management of the Nursing Department. As responsibilities later changed, she became responsible for nursing research at the hospital and served as Executive Director of the nursing research departments.

Her bond with her father was especially strong. He encouraged her dreams and even accompanied her to the United States when her brothers opposed the journey, enabling her to study, serve her country and contribute to the care of Qatar’s citizens and residents. During that period, she suffered the deepest loss of her life when her father—her refuge—died. Grief did not prevent her from continuing; it increased her sense of responsibility to fulfil the dream they shared. She completed her master’s degree in nursing. Although the experience was among the hardest she endured, it refined her character and deepened the values and principles he had instilled in her.

Her work at Hamad Medical Corporation from 1982 to 2021 encompassed clinical leadership, education and the development of Qatari nursing talent. She trained Qatar University’s final cohort of students in 1989 and supervised Hamad Medical Corporation’s inpatient departments in 1996. She was appointed Assistant Executive Director of Hamad Hospital across its departments in 1996. In 2001, she supervised an intensive critical-care course for the first cohort of twenty-three Qatari nursing graduates. In 2010, she published the first bilingual Arabic-English patient book on diabetes. In the Central Nursing Department, she trained Qatari nurses from Hamad-affiliated hospitals for professional and administrative roles and contributed to the graduation of more than eighty-two nurses from the corporation, as well as nurses from the country’s health centres in 2014. She also supervised Qatari participants in the International Council of Nurses’ Leadership for Change programme. From 2007 to 2011, she served as Executive Director of the Qatarisation Project in Hamad Medical Corporation’s Nursing Department, and in 2015 she was appointed Executive Director of the Nursing Research Department, a position she continues to hold.

Her academic publishing includes contributions to recognised scientific books. In 2016, she contributed material on diabetic-foot care, and in 2017 she published a section on counselling in a volume titled “Evidence-Based Advice”. She presented scientific papers at conferences in Arab countries, including the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon in 2019, and between 2010 and 2021 published numerous articles in specialised international journals covering nursing, diabetes, diabetic-foot care and management.

Throughout her career, she served on specialised committees at Hamad Medical Corporation concerned with nursing, pharmacy and governance. Since 2010, she has also reviewed medical research as an assistant editor for several specialised nursing and medical journals.

One achievement of which she is particularly proud is supervising a documentary that received the TV and Corporate Media Award at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. Filmed at several Hamad Medical Corporation locations, the short film follows a typical working day in the professional lives of Qatari nurses. It explains why they chose the profession and examines the effect of their work on Qatar’s health system. By showing the different dimensions of nursing care at the corporation, the film sought to attract young Qataris to nursing.

She found in her husband the same principles and values she had admired in her father. He consistently encouraged her to continue both her studies and her career and was an important source of inspiration and support during her doctorate, despite the demands of raising four children. His partnership helped her balance personal ambition with her responsibilities as a mother and wife.

Her academic, professional and private life brought significant difficulties. While studying in Britain, she experienced racist treatment from an academic supervisor who repeatedly tried to discourage her from completing a doctorate. Her husband’s support helped her withstand the negative comments and conduct and continue towards her goal. During the same period, she spent long stretches away from her children and could accompany only her infant son, then no more than forty days old.

She is now close to completing the third master’s degree of her academic career, in training and counselling through the British Council. The programme extends her capacity to train Qatari nursing professionals and contribute to a more accurate public understanding of the profession.