The year was 1992 and the Orbis Flying Eye Hospital had landed at Chiang Mai International Airport in the north of Thailand. Its mission: to provide training and mentorship to ophthalmologists and eye care professionals in my country. At the time I was a young doctor and a third year resident in ophthalmology at the […]
Category: Christmas appeal
BMJ Christmas charity appeal: Orbis’s Flying Eye Hospital—going places where other charities often can’t
I think if I wasn’t an anaesthetist, I would have liked to have been a pilot. There are a lot of similarities between the two: in terms of responsibility, and that it’s a practical, science based role. My job and my interest in aviation combine perfectly through the charity I volunteer for, Orbis, which fights […]
BMJ Christmas charity appeal: Bridging the gap in avoidable blindness
Tsenduren lives a nomadic life in Mongolia. He thought he was in his 70s and arrived at the Orbis Flying Eye hospital in his traditional clothes, having never visited the city before and having never seen an aircraft before. His failing vision had meant he felt a burden to his family and his greatest wish […]
Sarah Pickworth: Helping refugees in Greece
Doctors of the World has been helping refugees in various locations around Greece including Idomeni on the border with Macedonia. By early autumn around 10,000 refugees were pouring across this border every day. Sarah Pickworth, a general practitioner from the Highlands, has been providing medical care with the Greek Doctors off the World team in […]
Mohammed Bakir: a refugee camp on the fringes of society
We look on in silence from the car window as scenes of normality in central Calais, a typical Western European city, give way to the squalor and misery of the infamous refugee camp on the city outskirts known as “The Jungle.” There is no warning, no transition; the contrast is stark. Entering the camp, the […]
BMJ Christmas Appeal: How Doctors of the World helps refugees across Europe
The BMJ has chosen Doctors of the World for this year’s Christmas charity appeal. The charity’s executive director, Leigh Daynes explains how Doctors of the World is helping to bring care to the most vulnerable people across Europe and beyond. Have you ever been so cold and wet that your bones felt numb? I recently […]
Dave Albert: Cycling surgeons for safer surgery
Why would one ever consider cycling from Glasgow to London when there is a perfectly good train? Particularly if you choose a really hilly route, with 20 percent climbs through the Lake District and twice over the Pennines. This question was on our minds as we got colder and wetter and our legs struggled up […]
Krishna Chinthapalli on Atul Gawande—thinker, leader, doctor, writer
In 2009, Obama convened senior politicians in the Oval Office to discuss one magazine article: why were there Medicare costs of $15,000 per person per year in the Texan town of McAllen, when a neighbouring town had costs of $7,500 per person per year? Especially when the hospitals in McAllen were performing worse than its […]
Shauna Mullally on fixing the lack of medical equipment in Africa
I see a lot of medical equipment that isn’t working. In fact, that’s my job. I’m a biomedical engineer and I spend a lot of time in Africa working with hospital staff, educators, and policy makers trying to understand why equipment doesn’t work and trying to do something about it. The figures themselves speak loudly. […]
Iain H Wilson: Why pulse oximeters from Lifebox make such a difference
The first person I saw die accidentally from an anaesthetic accident was a kind, distinguished man in his sixties, scheduled for surgery to a large leg tumour. During anaesthesia his endotracheal tube became kinked, which was not noticed by the anaesthetist. Undetected hypoxia was quickly followed by cardiac arrest and then resuscitation attempts, resulting in […]