Tales of courage and caring from a conflict zone

COLCHESTER, U.K. - April 15, 2015 - PRLog -- Michael Roesch spent the month working with a team from the international medical charity Médicins Sans Frontières at Hospital Number Two in Gorlovka, 12 miles away from the frontline of Debaltseve.

Michael, who has worked for MSF in Nigeria and on the Iran/Iraq border, is no stranger to operating in difficult circumstances, but his time in Ukraine proved amongst the most challenging as he and his colleagues operated on 25 patients a day in one small theatre.

Explaining those challenges Michael said he had never seen so many amputees in his entire working life: these are due to the high energy injuries caused by the shelling: “The suburbs of the town, and increasingly the centre, were being shelled with grenades on a daily basis,” he said, “and so every day we received between five and 20, but at its height 60 casualties in one day and not a day passed without a limb amputation.

“MSF has brought equipment, medicine and medical teams but antibiotics are beginning to run low as are the sutures for stitching up wounds. The teams are now buying and sterilising yarn which fishermen use to repair their nets in order to close wounds.”

Michael is full of praise for his Ukrainian colleagues who he says manage to keep going in spite of the difficulties: “I have worked with MSF in some difficult environments, but I never felt as if my life was in danger in the way I did in Ukraine.

“My Ukrainiancolleagues kept coming in and doing an excellent job despite the fact that only one of them had experience of war zone surgery. It was a really tough job and they were incredibly good and committed.”

Michael says being back operating in the modern and sterile Care UK theatres in Shepton Mallet feels a million miles away from Gorlovka: “It feels like a dream. Everything is clean and new and organised. There we were operating with two beds in one theatre, with one scrub nurse working between the two operations.

“Here, at the treatment centre (http://www.sheptonmallettreatmentcentre.nhs.uk/), I would immediately stop an operation if I thought for a moment there was the slightest risk of contamination. There you just have to keep going because not to operate would mean death for the patient from their wounds.”

Care UK’s hospital director Chester Barnes and his team kept in touch with Michael by email and text through his month in Gorlovka. He said: “We greatly admire Michael’s courage and commitment but there was a collective sigh of relief when he returned to the centre.

“He is an excellent surgeon and a courageous and compassionate man and I am delighted that we have been able to help him raise money for MSF on his return both through events, such as his inspirational talk, and cake sales run by the team.”