Doctor

Joanne Oo carrying out a follow up consultation with a 6-day old baby and mother at the Point Pedro Hospital. © MSF

Medical doctor Joanne Oo from Sydney recently returned from her first field placement in Point Pedro, situated in the far north of Sri Lanka on the Jaffna Peninsula. Médecins Sans Frontières began a surgical project in the Point Pedro Hospital in December 2006 due to the increased armed conflict within the country. Working alongside Ministry of Health staff, our teams offer general and emergency surgery and obstetric assistance.

“I’ll never forget the taxi ride to the Sri Lankan Médecins Sans Frontières office in Colombo. The setting sun even more glorious amidst the pollution and haze, the colourful crowds heading for the temple on this ‘Poya Day’ and the warm breeze all mixed together with my excitement was wonderful. Of course, the evidence of those darker elements in Sri Lanka did not escape my attention either, seen in the poverty, malnutrition, overcrowding, and heavy presence of armed military at innumerable checkpoints.

At this point I must introduce the thoughts of one of our drivers who commented on my above story whilst we drove [after flying from Colombo to the project] to the Médecins Sans Frontières house in Point Pedro through fields of tobacco and red onion, dodging bikes, dogs and livestock:

“You [in the West] are too busy. Here’s not so busy. We have time…time to smile… to be with our family…no one is in a rush. We are free.”

I think this gives us all something to think about. I guess it is all about perspective.

My work here at Point Pedro Hospital as the Emergency Unit Physician is much like what I do at home - attending to acute care patients. Although the resources and staff here are quite different from the way it is at home, I am really enjoying my placement. It didn't feel like it took too long for me to settle in and time has just whizzed past!

My days usually vary, but with an unusual amount of energy for this heat, I went jogging this morning around our 310 metre restricted perimeter. It was an amazing sunrise, a fiery crimson ball rising over the tobacco fields, and it put me in a good mood. I then joined my cosmopolitan expat team for breakfast. The current team is quite relaxed and we work alongside each other nicely. The national staff are also a pleasure to work alongside. It is a privilege to work and live here amongst these people and my team.

At 8am I am called in slightly early to see a 53 year old lady breathless from acute heart failure. This is followed in quick succession by a man with chest pain, a young father who has amnesia from a motorbike accident, and an elderly man who is paralysed on the right side of his body from a stroke. I also go to the ward to check on a man who came in with petroleum and Toddy (local Palm Tree brew) poisoning. The huge number and types of poisonings I see here is incomparable to home.

Whilst I tend to the critical care patients that come through the Emergency Unit and wards, the operating theatre is busy running cases. Our obstetrician/gynaecologist is doing her antenatal scanning clinic and the Field Coordinator is trying to negotiate staff travel clearance. At lunch we come together to have a ‘Field Association Debate’, discussing the Médecins Sans Frontières charter and why we are here in Point Pedro. We all agree that this project is intended to give Point Pedro Hospital specialist medical support and the medical supplies it lacks. We’re heartedly reassured that the local community is very supportive and appreciative of our work.

Despite everything they have gone through, the amazing nature of those we are helping is seen everyday.  The Sri Lankan people are polite, gentle, jovial and all wear a pearly, radiant smile.”

Médecins Sans Frontières is the only international medical aid organisation present in Point Pedro serving a population of 113,000. In the Jaffna Peninsula, the entire population is affected by restrictions, and the free circulation of persons is heavily constrained. Médecins Sans Frontières teams are also currently working in various health structures around the town of Vavuniya, as well as running field hospitals near the Manik Farm displacement camps. More than 280,000 civilians who fled the recent intense fighting between the Sri Lankan and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are estimated to be living in the camps.