Earthquakes/Tsunamis (Page 4)

First-time Canadian Red Cross delegate Dr. Michael Boroditsky of Winnipeg shares his experiences working in a rural emergency field hospital in Dhunche, Nepal. 

Six months on from the Nepal earthquakes, we take a look at recovery still taking place in devastated regions. These are photos from Nepal, where the Canadian Red Cross set up a field hospital to provide emergency medical care following the earthquake six months ago. 

On the six-month anniversary of the Nepal earthquakes, Al Alcock, a Canadian Red Cross aid worker from Whitehorse, lists colourful memories of  time spent with the disaster relief and recovery team, which continues its efforts there.
 
Six months after the Nepal earthquakes, I’m thinking of the people I met while working at the Canadian Red Cross field hospital in the remote village of Dhunche. Here’s what sticks in my mind after four weeks working there.

With 20 other highly-trained Red Cross delegates, plus a mobile field hospital and operating theatre, Lynn flew into Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu shortly after the first earthquake.

Within a few days, an entire Basic Health Care facility had taken shape near the remote village of Khokundole. The night they finished, Lynn pulled on her toque and climbed into a sleeping bag, knowing her real work would start the next day.

All is abuzz at as preparations get underway for the handover of the Canadian Red Cross field hospital (ERU) to the District Health Office in Dhunche, Nepal. Orders are being filled to replenish medicines and equipment; boxes are being counted and recounted for accuracy; and the din of ongoing training sessions for doctors and nurses continues, punctuated only by the laughter of children playing in the nearby psychosocial support tent.

It was a great surprise at our Burnaby, B.C. office as six-year-old Zeyan Walji dropped off a whopping $881 to support the Canadian Red Cross Nepal Region Earthquake Fund. Zeyan asked his friends and family for cash donations to help people in Nepal, in lieu of other gifts for his birthday.

The message read “Today, August 4, we transported our dear Mr. Smiley and his brother to Dhulikhel Spinal Cord Injury”. It was sent by Red Cross nurse Kirsty Robertson of Toronto who is part of the current Canadian Red Cross team working at the field hospital in rural Dhunche, Nepal. She was eager to share Mr. Smiley’s happy outcome, as it has been a team effort.

Natasha Osmond, a perioperative nurse from Halifax, recently returned from Dhunche, a rural community in Nepal, where she worked at the Red Cross field hospital. On this, her first overseas assignment, Natasha was responsible for patient safety, legal aspects of nursing, and management of nursing activities related to surgery.