A Dubai-based medical charity is facing its toughest challenge yet as its doctors and nurses cope with power cuts and defective equipment during a humanitarian mission in Gaza.
A team of seven medical professionals from the UAE and several other countries have spent the past five days treating sick children at the Gaza European Hospital. The medics, four of whom are based in Dubai, have performed 16 "very complicated" surgeries and screened more than 70 children, according to Aileen Culligan, one of the organisers with the Little Wings Foundation, the charity sponsoring the mission.
Frequent power cuts create havoc in the clinic's operating rooms, forcing the medics to rely on battery-operated head torches.
"We expected more screenings, but the doctors considered about 90 per cent of these cases to be extremely complicated," Ms Culligan said from Gaza this week.
"The electricity here is intermittent - yesterday alone it cut out three times, and twice during the night."
The non-profit foundation, which specialises in paediatric orthopaedic surgery, has sent doctors and nurses to embattled locations including Haiti, Eritrea and the West Bank on previous missions, but the logistical problems of transporting medical supplies to Gaza, combined with the electricity problems, are making this five-day mission - for which Little Wings personnel required 340kg of equipment and supplies - the charity's most challenging yet.
Gillian Beale, the operating theatre nurse and mission logistics coordinator, was shocked at the condition of most of the juvenile patients.
"The children are very malnourished and anaemic," said Ms Beale, who works at the Medcare Hospital in Dubai. "This makes surgery very difficult, because you lose blood during surgery and it affects their ability to heal." The hospital has its own modern equipment, but personnel often face difficulties importing the spare parts for it.
"The sterilisers are the biggest problem; they break down every day, which delays surgery," said Ms Beale.
"When the power goes it's horrible; the operating rooms generally don't have windows, and outside there are no streetlights. Whatever the politics, war or poverty, the children are the innocent party. This is why we are here, even though it's difficult."
The hospital is guaranteed eight hours of electricity a day, but the blackouts come frequently and with no warning, no matter the guarantees. When the power suddenly dies, the doctors and nurses are forced to rely on two overhead lamps powered by a generator.
The mission's anaesthetist, Dr Paul Castillo, wears a head torch at all times, a precaution that helps him monitor patients whether there is electricity or not.
"We are balancing between living and not living," said Dr Castillo.
"The amazing thing here is life goes on and everyone has been very friendly and welcoming, they are very grateful." Dr Castillo, who practises in Stockholm, said another challenge was becoming familiar - in short order - with medicines and machines he had never used.
"It's a struggle with every patient," he said.
"Especially when the power goes; you don't see anything."
One of the mission's most complicated cases was 14-year-old Feras el Nadeem, who this January was shot, along with his father and two brothers, during a skirmish with Israeli soldiers. His father died from his wounds, and one of Feras's knees was shattered, leaving him unable to walk. He underwent surgery on Sunday, and is now in rehabilitation, learning to walk again.
Dr Marc Sinclair, the founder of Little Wings and an orthopaedic surgeon at Medcare Hospital, said "post-traumatic deformities" were common in the free clinics.
"You meet family members who have lost brothers and sisters and have serious injuries that they still suffer from," he said. "Some of the cases are very, very complex, but that's also of academic interest to us. When the power goes it can be very difficult, especially if you have a knife in your hand. But the work is so important and everyone has helped."
The Little Wings Foundation closes up shop in Gaza today. munderwood@thenational.ae
