| Medical Ethnology I: Little Sushma's Story (Satis Shroff) Comment |
Article by Satis  posted on 27.03.10 |
Medical Ethnology I: Little Sushma’s Story (Satis Shroff)
The case history of a small girl named Sushma is typical for Nepal. Sushma was 6 years old when she was playing near an open fire, and wriggled into the fire with her feet and received third degree burns on her feet and right leg. All the toes were burnt and the wounds on her leg were infected. She was in a critical stage. The German-Nepalese team carried out the initial life-saving treatment during the surgical camp. Since it was impossible to carry out further treatment in Surkhet, the team decided to transport the despairing mother and the suffering child to the Interplast hospital in Sankhu.
In the following months little Sushma was operated five times and countless swabs had to be changed and her wounds bandaged. As the wound healing progressed, Sushma’s mother helped her daughter take water baths. Sushma was discharged seven months later and it was a wonderful case of assistance in a developing country through the mutual cooperation between Germans and Nepalese surgeons. Sushma wears orthopedic shoes now and modern medicine has given her a new life and hope, despite the loss of all toes and a part of her foot.
It’s a delight to see Sushma laugh again with her mother. Wonders happen.
The Interplast idea was born in the USA, a project to treat people who suffer from injuries through fire, weapons in war and anomalies during the birth. Such operations are expensive and cannot be carried out by the local surgeons in the so-called Third World countries. The idea was to send plastic surgeons to these countries and perform operations with the assistance of their counterparts. If no experts were available, Interplast also did the job of training them.
In Nepal there’s a hospital for Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery in Sankhu, which is in the vicinity of Katmandu. The Nepalese counterpart is the Sushma Koirala Memorial Trust (SKM) and is run since 1999 by the German surgeon Dr. Andreas Settje. The hospital has 50 beds and the work is done with the help of Nepalese doctors and voluntary specialists from Germany. Over 1,800 surgical operations are performed annually. Additionally, there’s the 24 hour emergency service for the local people of Sankhu, a dental ward, physical therapy for post-operative cases and other facilities which the local people use.
Interplast Nepal has a teaching-hospital character and trains Nepalese nurses and physicians. This is an excellent example of helping people in a developing country to help themselves, and to render medical assistance to poor people in the long run. The patients are asked to pay whatever they can afford, but for people who don’t have any financial resources, the therapy is free of charge.
The hospital manager is Ms. Christa Drigalla, the technical supervisor is Hein Stahl and Dr. Andreas Settje is the chief surgeon. Lilo Knörrich, who is a physical therapist, has worked many times in the hospital. A regular visiting plastic surgeon is Dr. Hubertus Tikoru and he is responsible for the training of Nepalese medical personnel. Professor Dieter Pape, surgeon, was the first medical director of the SKM-hospital. A Nepalese surgeon Dr. Raju Pandey also operates with his German counterparts. Dr.Sybille Keller, who is a regular visiting dentist, coordinates all voluntary work of the dentists, and Dr. Klaus Macher, a dental surgeon, takes care of the financial aspect of Interplast’s dental department.
The surgeons of the SKM hospital travel to different part of the mountainous country where operation camps are organised. A team of workers go ahead as a vanguard and seek prospective patients for operations, get their basic data and photograph the patients and their injuries. A three-day jeep ride is normal in hilly Nepal, and the majority of the people live in inaccessable areas where there aren’t any medical facilities. In a surgical camp 80 to 100 operations are done. The hospital staff organise free transport to the hospital in Sankhu when the patients have to undergo major operations. One such regular camp is the district hospital in Surkhet (Western Nepal), which is 650 km away from Katmandu. It takes two days to negotiate this distance. The district hospital in Surkhet has only two physicians and has to treat over 100,000 patients.
(In case you’d like to help other such Sushma’s in Nepal please make a donation by looking up: www.nepal-hospital.de). |
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