Madagascar: Access to surgical care
83 images Created 17 Feb 2016
2 billion people lack access to any surgical care. Only 4% of an estimated 234 million surgical procedures performed each year go to the poorest third of the global population.
Operation Smile has secured funding to build a permanent cleft and surgical centre in Madagascar. This assignment was to document the current situation for people in need of surgery and their options. In all cases the barriers to care were financial, not just to pay for the operation and medicine but to pay for transportation to get to a hospital that was often more than a day away.
We spent time with a family in the rural highlands whose first child, Alpha was born with a cleft. They have left their rural home and walked to the nearest city Antisarbe where father, Oliver works as a cyclo driver saving what money he can for Alpha’s surgery. Mother Josiane, 21 stays at a nun’s missionary hoping for news of an Operation Smile surgery where Alpha can receive free surgery. More pictures here..
We spent two days in Antsirabe hospital documenting the working day (and most of the evening) of the General Surgeon Dr Randriamihaja. The hospital has a two-ward system of public and paid for private wards and all medicines must be bought by the patients at the hospital pharmacy. Patients in the public wards must wait to hear if their applications for free surgery have been approved by the hospitals emergency fund.
We also documented the Operation Smile 2015 mission to Tamatave that provided free surgeries for 118 patients. The international team worked with local surgeons, doctors, dentists, nurses and speech pathologists that may play a crucial role in the new centre. There were 22 patients who were unable to receive surgery during the mission including 25 year old Gernaine a noma patient who required complex craniofacial surgery. Gernaine has been placed on the waiting list for the World Care program for surgeries beyond the scope of a normal mission.
Operation Smile has secured funding to build a permanent cleft and surgical centre in Madagascar. This assignment was to document the current situation for people in need of surgery and their options. In all cases the barriers to care were financial, not just to pay for the operation and medicine but to pay for transportation to get to a hospital that was often more than a day away.
We spent time with a family in the rural highlands whose first child, Alpha was born with a cleft. They have left their rural home and walked to the nearest city Antisarbe where father, Oliver works as a cyclo driver saving what money he can for Alpha’s surgery. Mother Josiane, 21 stays at a nun’s missionary hoping for news of an Operation Smile surgery where Alpha can receive free surgery. More pictures here..
We spent two days in Antsirabe hospital documenting the working day (and most of the evening) of the General Surgeon Dr Randriamihaja. The hospital has a two-ward system of public and paid for private wards and all medicines must be bought by the patients at the hospital pharmacy. Patients in the public wards must wait to hear if their applications for free surgery have been approved by the hospitals emergency fund.
We also documented the Operation Smile 2015 mission to Tamatave that provided free surgeries for 118 patients. The international team worked with local surgeons, doctors, dentists, nurses and speech pathologists that may play a crucial role in the new centre. There were 22 patients who were unable to receive surgery during the mission including 25 year old Gernaine a noma patient who required complex craniofacial surgery. Gernaine has been placed on the waiting list for the World Care program for surgeries beyond the scope of a normal mission.
