Mercy Flyers Teaches Critical Care

19 January 2010

Dr Craig Oranmore-Brown has been invited by the University Teaching Hospital in Lusaka to teach Critical Care Medicine to the doctors and nurses in the ICU.  Craig is the only Intensive Care consultant in Lusaka and as such has been asked to help in this central ICU in the country.  He will be doing a weekly teaching ward round.  There has been no ICU consultant in this hospital for as long as the staff can remember.  Only the sister in charge has formal ICU training.  We are looking for ICU consultants and experienced ICU nurses who will volunteer to come out short-term and help with teaching in the department.

MF Joins United Nations (UNFPA) in Mansa

25 November 2009

In November Mercy Flyers partnered with the UNFPA to carry out a combined fistula surgery outreach in the town of Mansa in Luapula province, Northern Zambia. We see this as an exciting development in our efforts to form a more cohesive approach to the management of this distressing condition in this country. The benefit of this combined outreach is that each team can learn from the other and combine resources in recruiting and managing patients with fistula. Dr Craig Oranmore-Brown taught 3 anaesthetic clinical officers how to use spinal anaesthesia for this surgery which significantly reduces the cost of anaesthesia at the same time as improving the safety of anaesthesia.

We operated on 44 patients of whom 35 had a fistula. One of our patients had suffered from a fistula for 45 years!

We look forward to further combined outreaches next year. We have made an agreement with the Ministry of Health to be recognised for training of Gynaecology registrars on our outreaches. A registrar from the University Teaching Hospital attended the combined outreach and received training from both consultants present. We hope that we will have a registrar on all our future outreaches. Training of Gynaecologists in the skill of fistula surgery is a pressing need, as this surgery is complicated and requires specialised training.

Portable anaesthetic machine sponsored by the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain & Ireland (AAGBI)

6 August 2009

"The objectives of the AAGBI are to make available the highest standards of anesthesia, pain treatment, trauma management and resuscitation to all peoples of the world. These goals are achieved through the work of the AAGBI standing committees - education, publications, safety and quality - all of whose reports are available on the website. Subspecialty committees on obstetric anesthesia, pain, pediatric anesthesia, trauma and resuscitation provide a focus on their particular areas of expertise. "
AAGBI website.

This international organisation has very kindly sponsored Mercy Flyers with a portable anaesthetic machine for use on our outreaches. The entire machine fits in a suitcase the size of cabin luggage on an aircraft. This means we will always have a safe anaesthetic delivery system on our surgical outreaches. This is particularly important for our young patients allowing us to give them a gentle inhalational anaesthetic as kids would receive in the modern world. Mercy Flyers follows the principles of excellence in anaesthetic practice as laid down by the World Health Organisation, and the WFSA is very supportive of us in this regard. The AAGBI also provides on-line educational resources which we use for training clinical officer anaesthetists in the bush.

Mercy Flyers repairs 17 fistulas on outreach to Chitokoloki

3 July 2009

During the first week of July '09 seventeen patients presented at the fistula clinic for surgery. Chitokoloki is a mission station on the banks of the Zambezi river in the far north west of Zambia. Twelve of the patients had been brought down by bus from the Mwinilunga area to the north. They all received surgery and recovered well. This is a 200% increase on our last attendance there which means the message is getting out to the patients in the villages that finally a lifeline of hope has been extended to them. We believe there are many more patients out there and look forward to our next visit.

Charity registration in Zambia

21 February 2009

It has taken a year of negotiating and red tape but we are very excited to announce that we are now a registered charity in Zambia. We are very grateful to Health Help International for their support in allowing us to operate under their organisation up to this point. We will continue to operate in partnership with HHI but now we can 'stand on our own two feet' so to speak.