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S E M S O n l i n e N e w s l e t t e r |
I s s u e 2 0 0 7 |
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Medical Mission Trip
to Philippines - Typhoon Reming and Utor |
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Living in a country that is sheltered from major natural disasters, Singaporeans are a fortunate group, but last December, we had a small taste of what Mother Nature can conjure up. The freak weather on Dec 20 2006 rained for more than 24 hours causing floods and landslides in many areas. Philippines was being hit by two severe typhoons in the span of one month.
The two typhoons ravaged the Albay province of The Philippines, with wind speeds of up to 265km/h, the wind and rained carried loose volcanic mud from the nearby Mount Mayon Volcano down to homes and streets, killing few thousands than 1000 and displacing more than 800 000.
We received news from our administrators on 12th December that Mercy Relief, a Non-Governmental Organization would like to dispatch two medical teams for humanitarian disaster response. The first team was scheduled to leave on 13th December 2006. Changi General Hospital decided to send a team to help. It comprised of two doctors and two nurses. I was happy to be able to go as a team for I have already volunteered myself under SingHealth cluster since 2005 but was never sent out for any disaster mission. I have been to two mission trips in year 2000 and 2002 to Myanmar but those were during peace time. When I knew that I was nominated to go, I immediately prepared my family mentally on this trip. They were very supportive and knew that it is my passion and I am mentally and physically prepared to help.
Our team members include Dr Lee Haw Chou, Dr Edward Pratt, Senior staff nurse, Arlene and I. We began to make preparation for the trip on 15th Dec; we had our immunizations, luggage and passport all in readiness, waiting for further instruction from Mercy Relief. We had a first meeting with Dr Low Cheng Ooi, he briefed us on the situation over there. Our members had a pre- counseling session organized by Dr Adeline Chan (Psychiatric) .We were scheduled to leave on the 19th December but there was no flight. We waited patiently for the news and were told that the flight was confirmed on 20th December 2006.
We met at the Changi Airport at 7am. We were glad that there were many people to send us off. We went with a volunteer logistician, a photographer and a Mercy Relief coordinator to provide assistance. We bought along almost 300kg of medical supplies.
Before landing in Legaspi City, a major town of the Albay Province, we were awestruck with the aerial view of the majestic Mount Mayon volcano which spewed smoke like a sleeping giant. Mount Mayon is the most active volcano in the Philippines, with a quiet eruption on July 14th 2006, the slopes of Mayon were covered with loose volcanic lava that cooled to become mud and boulders.
Upon landing, we saw the immediate destruction of the typhoon; with the roof of the airport looking like it was violently ripped apart. Driving deeper into town, we started to see that most roofs were damaged and telephone poles and electrical lines were toppled over. The environment was very much like Singapore in the early 60's . We stayed in a dominatory- many rooms with partitions where you can hear others talking. The room was small, the electricity was provided through a generator. Hot water was only available only when there was electricity. The flow of water from the tap was of low flow. However, it was better than what we have expected. We thought it would be like Tsunami where they slept at the base -camp. At least we have a room. Rental was $20/day .We slept on bed but no blanket. Fortunately we had brought along sleeping bag and we improvised it as blanket.
After numerous meetings with the local NGOs and volunteer organizations, we were tasked to provide medical treatment to six evacuation centres and the local department of health attached three local volunteer nurses to us as well. The 12 day relief mission saw us delivering medical treatment to more than 900 evacuees, rebuilding a roof, providing health education on management of head lice and psycho-social therapy programmes for the children.
Driving to the outskirts of town to the numerous evacuation centres, we started to see destruction that the volcanic mud caused. The pitch black volcanic mud covered everything, with the roads barely cleared. The evacuation centres we visited were all public schools and each classroom packed more than 15 families.
Day two saw many evacuation centres receiving large tents capable of fitting a family of ten in each tent from the Rotary International Club. This eased the packed living conditions for many but they still faced the danger of not having a hard roof over their heads and very bad sanitary conditions. Whenever we reached an evacuation centre, hundreds would queue up to seek treatment and the majority of those treated were women and children as the men were out rebuilding or working. They were very happy to receive foreign medical teams.
There wasn't many serious medical cases except for minor injuries, cold and flu symptoms. Some adults presented with post traumatic distress symptoms such as insomnia, headache etc. We saw a fairly good mixed, because most people came for consultation when they heard that a foreign medical team has arrived. We saw an average of about 50 patients/day. The nurses’ role was to do dressing, dispense medication etc. We conducted the clinic from 8.30am to about 6pm. At night, we packed medication and prepared consultation forms for the next day.
There were many challenges that we faced. Communication was one of the challenges because not all the people can understand English. We managed to learn some mono-syllabus. We are also fortunately to have SSN Arlene "Philippines nurse" and volunteer nurses with us, they help to translate for us. But i think "body language” played an important role too. Another challenge was to eat and drink in such environment, where you could literally see dirt everywhere. When we went to one evacuation centre, we saw a 'corpse" in a black bag on the floor, no one seems to clear it. When you walked near it, you could smell it. They told us that they did not have no money to buy coffin. It was really sad to hear that.
As the majority of Filipinos are Roman Catholic, Christmas was a big affair for them but due to the disaster, many of the evacuees had nothing to celebrate about as many were left literally with the clothes on their backs. Thus, we went to town and bought toys, food and sketching books for the children and played Santa to one evacuation centre in Banag.
Two days after Christmas, the Philippines correspondent from Channel News Asia arrived to do a special on the disaster. They tagged along with us as we set out to conduct a psycho-social programme for the children, where the children sought to express their feelings through drawings.
Before returning home, we were brought to have a look at a location where the mudslide hit hard and it was a surreal experience. An area as far as the eye could see was covered with volcanic mud and boulders the size of vans. The local volunteer nurses told us that this entire area used to be homes to thousands.
Leaving the Philippines, we all felt that we played a part in helping and as the acute medical phase was over, the next phase of reconstruction was to begin. We may not be able to help everyone but definitely we have help someone. I was asked if I would like to go again for disaster mission trip. My answer is “yes”. I am sure all my team members have learnt very much through this experience, it left an imprint in us that we will never forget. I learnt that lives are precious; everyday is a gift from God. Treasure all those around us, render help whenever possible. You will really be enriched by the experience for every mission trip is different.
SNC Elaine Ng
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Copyright © 2005 The Society for Emergency Medicine in Singapore |
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The Society for Emergency Medicine in Singapore c/o Department of Emergency Medicine Singapore General Hospital, Outram Road, S169608 Phone +65 63213558 Fax +65 63214873 |