Airmen, Soldiers work with Hondurans to provide care

  • Published
  • By 1st Lt. Ali Tedesco
  • Joint Task Force-Bravo Public Affairs
SOTO CANO AIR BASE, Honduras (AFPN) --  Outside the double doors, the waiting area looked like any typical hospital. On Aug. 3, a couple waited tensely for news about their son’s procedure, while a young girl in a teddy bear hospital gown giggled with her family while waiting her turn to see the doctors.

But the work taking place inside the operating room at Regional Hospital Santa Teresa was anything but typical. The Honduran hospital’s chief of surgery worked hand-in-hand with a team of U.S. Soldiers and Airmen from Joint Task Force-Bravo to remove a gallbladder from an elderly patient.

Though the team’s composition is unique, the American medics have actually become a fixture at the local Comayagua hospital.

The medics here began supporting the hospital sporadically in 1997, but since 2000 they have been conducting medical readiness training exercises at the hospital two or three times a week.

Each week, the team operates on 10 to 13 patients, and have treated more than 250 Hondurans this year, said Army Capt. Preston Powell, the task forces’ medical element’s planning and operations officer.

“It’s a great benefit for me and the hospital to have the U.S. medics help out,” said Dr. Jose Angel Mejia, the hospital’s chief surgeon. “We lack a lot of equipment to provide proper patient care, to include everything from surgical instruments to sterile linens and scrubs.”

Often times, surgeries have to be canceled or postponed until U.S. forces can bring critical tools, supplies or expertise. Santa Teresa is a charity hospital, which means all services are provided to the patients free of charge. Yet this also means the hospital is very needy, as equipment is often broken or people are on strike, said Carlos Duron, the medical element’s medical liaison officer.

Mr. Duron is responsible for meeting with the Honduran Minister of Health to determine humanitarian assistance priorities. In coordination with U.S. Southern Command, the exercise sites are determined a year in advance. The exercises at Santa Teresa are considered part of one ongoing general surgery medical readiness training exercise.

Besides providing a surgical team, the task force supplies all of the medical equipment for the procedures, from life-support monitoring devices to the basic consumables like needles, gauze, sutures and staples. The U.S. contributes about $20,000 each year to maintain operations at Santa Teresa.

“It’s the best feeling in the world knowing that all our hard work has paid off and touched the life of another human through a surgical intervention that under other circumstances may not have been possible,” said Army Capt. Brent Ramsey, the medical element’s officer in charge of the operating room.

For the U.S. medics, it is also unique chance to train.

“Everyone who works on the team with Dr. Mejia and myself are part of our forward-surgical team, so this provides real-life training for us to work together in an environment that we otherwise wouldn’t be exposed to,” said Army Col. (Dr.) Craig Shriver, a surgeon.

The team operates seamlessly despite their differences. Deployed Airmen have recently joined the once all-Army team, filling critical shortfalls like an anesthesiologist and medical logistics positions.

“This is really good training for me because back in the (United) States I wouldn’t have the chance to be as involved,” said Tech. Sgt. Kurt Lutz, noncommissioned officer in charge of medical logistics. “Now, I actually understand what they are requesting supply wise, as well as what things are used for and why they need more.”

With two military services and a Spanish-speaking surgeon on board, a language barrier might be expected. But in the Santa Teresa operating room, differences among the medics were imperceptible as the team of professionals finished stitching up the first patient and began sterilizing the room for the day’s second operation.

For these medics, it was just another day in the operating room. For the patients and their families, it was an unforgettable U.S. gift.