A little over one year after the state-of-the-art hospital at Lethem was officially opened surgeries were performed in its theatre for the first time over the weekend and over thirty persons benefited.
Acting Regional Health Officer (RHO) of Region Nine, Dr Irv Chan told Stabroek News that the surgeries were undertaken as a result of a visit to the hospital by a medical team of 11 from Georgetown and up to last evening team members were still working there. They started the ball rolling as soon as they arrived and worked right up to 2.30am yesterday morning and returned to duty at 7.30am.
Months after the hospital was opened residents in the region were complaining of having to be referred for simple fractures because even though the theatre was equipped the human resources were lacking. This could be a thing of the past according to Coordinator of Indigenous People at the Ministry of Health Patricia Singh, who told this newspaper that the team, which represented a public/private sector initiative, would be making monthly visits to the hospital with the next one planned for the last two days of next month. The exercise being carried out by the team is similar to the one the Ministry of Health has initiated at the Mabaruma hospital.
“This will be a regular surgical outreach,” Nurse Singh told Stabroek News. The 11 member team includes personnel from Woodlands and St Joseph’s Mercy Hospitals as well as the Georgetown Public and Diamond Hospitals.
According to Dr Chan both minor and major surgeries were performed by the hospital and the patients were drawn from various areas in the region from as far as Annai and Aishalton. He explained that the patients were selected on the basis of their complaints and how serious those complaints were. While many of the patients that were operated on were selected before the team arrived, others who heard of the team’s presence flocked to the hospital and they were seen as well, while some were also operated on.
The RHO revealed that a young child who suffered a serious fracture recently happened to visit the hospital on Saturday and he was immediately operated on. All the patients, according to the RHO, were catered for by the hospital and many will soon be transferred to their various locations at the expense of the region.
“This is the first time surgeries were done at the hospital but this will be continuing,” Dr Chan told this newspaper. He added that the various health institutions in the region would assist in indentifying the patients who would be seen by the team whenever they are at the hospital. Nurse Singh told this newspaper that the hospital has doctors to take care of the patients after the team has left.
Years of pain
For 40-year-old Balinda Xavier, a teacher from Karaudarnau located in the Deep South Rupunini, having the surgery done at the Lethem Hospital on Saturday was like a “miracle.” The fact that she had to travel 100 miles from her village was the least of the mother of four’s concerns, as the thought of finally getting rid of a pain that has been with her for years was all the comfort she needed She has been suffering from an abdominal pain since 1996 and for years there was no diagnosis until in 2007 when she did a ultra sound at the Balwant Singh Hospital and was told she was suffering from gallstones.
If she had had the money she could have had the stones removed immediately, but Xavier said she could not afford to have it done. So she was forced to continue for some more years with the pain she said which intensified as time passed, and she was a regular visitor to the Lethem Hospital for medication which assisted in making the pain bearable. She recalled that she had met Nurse Singh some time back and had approached her for assistance to have the surgery done and while it did not happen right away Xavier said she was happy that it was finally done.
She got a call on Wednesday last and a few hours later she was on her way to Aishalton from where she travelled to Lethem arriving at around 11.30pm. By them she was in tremendous pain and had to have injections administered immediately before finally catching up on some sleep,
“I always hoped and prayed that it [being operated on] would become a reality, and today it is, I am so happy,” Xavier told this newspaper from the hospital yesterday.
“I feel I am the luckiest person right now,” she added even though she revealed that she was still in a lot of pain at the time from the surgery.
The teacher said she was proud to have had the surgery done in the region and she hoped that the initiative would continue so that the many persons who were in need of the assistance would be helped. She said it was not only less expense for her, but having it done in her own region and not being brought to George-town or sent to Boa Vista meant a lot to her.
Some of the surgeries performed over the weekend included cholecystectomy (removal of gallstones); hydrocele (draining of the accumulation of serous fluid in a bodily cavity); removal of hernias; and bilateral tubal ligation (tying a woman’s tubes for contraceptive purposes).
