Health visit to Rai Coast

Saidor situation symptomatic of nationwide health problems

 

By Patrick Matbob

The medical team of specialist doctors and support staff of Madang General Hospital struggled against the heavy surf to unload their cargoes on to a rusting metal and wooden pier at Saidor station.

Dr George Kuzma checking the patients.

The bay offered little protection to boats and the locals say that many boats have either been damaged or sunk in the bay.

The team was in a hurry, being already a week and a day late for the appointment with the people of Raicoast district. The doctors were there to see patients, carry out health awareness talks and to check the health centre facilties and medical equipemnt.

As the station’s only government vehicle, a Toyota Landcruiser drove off with the cargo and some of the doctors, others took a walk up to the station in the steaming midday sun.

A talkative middle-age woman accompanied by her two children said many patients had been waiting for a week and some had left for their villages on the coast or in the mountains of Finisterre range.

The heat and the uneven surface of the track made walking difficult for one of the doctor and the old woman apologised.

“Mipela ol Raikos i no lukim lait yet,” she says. (Raicoast people have yet to see the light).

 

Dr Geita interviews a mother.

It was not a religious comment. She was criticising what she saw as lack of development in the area. Many locals on the station also expressed similar sentiments saying that their leaders had neglected them.

Saidor is a spacious station lined with aging buildings and areas of overgrown grass. Linked by a network of dusty gravel tracks, it has a health centre, two main stores, an airstrip, government office, a school, an agriculture station and a Catholic mission with a large YC building. The station had been without electricity for more than two weeks because of lack of fuel for the generator. Near the station is Nankina river that rages down from the Finnisterre Range. The icy-cool waters of Nankina offers much relief from the sheering heat but efforts to tame the river has been unsuccessful. The power of the torrents and the unstable nature of the terrain had defied human engineering feats to bridge it. Nankina had only recently claimed a life after destroying the bridge built over it.

This has been the story of most of the 70 rivers and creeks that exist between Madang and Saidor station. Attempts to build and maintain a highway linking Saidor remains impossible.

The abundance of water though has given the station an adequate water supply built by the provincial government and the local people with the assistance of European Union.

The project is impressive in terms of community participation where the landowners had offered their water source free of charge for it to be dammed. EU provided the resources to build the water supply and pipe it down to the station. Unfortunately, the project is incomplete and water still needs to be piped to parts of the station.

The health centre was built about five years ago by the Melanesian Foundation and Rotary club of Australia. Surrounded by tall grass, the buildings are nevertheless impressive with carpeted floors and consist of a labour ward, two wards for inpatients, an outpatient, a theatre, an office and a medical store.

The Catholic mission is no doubt the best part of the station with wide lawns, neat gardens and large shady trees. Fr Casper, a local who is the parish priest, kindly allows the large YC building to be used by sick people from remote rural areas who come to the station for medical help.

The YC was packed with patients for the medical team’s visit. The specialist doctors include obstetrician and gynaecologist Lahui Geita, health promotions Philip Kame, anaesthetist Getrude Didei, resident paediatrician Joseph Ande and surgeon Br George Kuzma.

For the patients, it was a long awaited opportunity to see a doctor and the complaints were many and varied from back-ache to suspected tuberculosis cases.

Dr Geita tackled the mothers with health problems from bearing too many children. It was difficult task trying to get the wives and husbands to talk and plan their families and to space their children. This was where Dr Kame’s health promotion talks and videos came in handy during the evenings and many people said they learnt a lot.

In the end, the team won over a good number of husbands who volunteered to undergo vasectomy operations. Unlike tubal ligation for women, the minor operation did not require them to recover at the health centre. Still some men spent anxious moments worrying about their precious virility but when all was explained to them, they joked humorously about “katim rop bilong vanila’ (cutting their vanilla vines.)

The health promotion videos were really popular and covered topics such as HIV AIDS, drugs, alcohol abuse, teenage pregnancies, sexually transmitted infections, nutrition and diseases such as cancer and malaria.

Surgeon Dr George Kuzma performed some minor surgery but had to refer most cases to the main hospital because of lack of proper theatre equipment.

Dr Getrude Didei, anaesthetist assisted Dr Kuzma with the operations while paediatrician Dr Joseph Ande comforted and checked the large number of scared children suffering from a variety of afflictions.

Other members of the medical team also serviced medical equipment and ensured there was adequate supplies at the medical store.

 While the visit was welcome, it also revealed the sad situation of a deteriorating health services in the rural areas of Madang. Without adequate funding, the health centre staff has not been able to carry out regular patrols into the villagers to attend to health problems and imunise children.

A nurse spoke of how they had gone on their own initiative to a village following a report of an outbreak of tuberculosis. Her team diagnosed and treated 140 cases.

Program Manager for Health Kuyan Kamas also reported that while they had a boat, there was no money for fuel or patrol allowances to cover costs for the health workers.

Response from the provincial health office in Madang offered little relief. There was no money and the situation would remain so for some time.

Health services in Madang are partly funded by donor funds through the Health Services Improvement Program (HSIP) but the funds have been suspended since 2001 when officers responsible for the use of the fund had not accounted for it.

While the issue drags on, people throughout the province are suffering and dying. It is a sad story of incompetence and corruption by certain people in the public service that has affected the provision of services to the people.

The medical team had originally planned to visit Long Island however, due to transport problems had to return to Madang on the fourth day.

ends