Slippery Sally

From Di Brown, RN, PhD. Volunteer, Australian Volunteers International. Bali, Sept 30^th 2010

Rumah Sakit Umum Pusat (Sanglah General Hospital), located in Denpasar, Bali is the largest hospital in eastern Indonesia and is the major referral centre for the populations of eastern Indonesia and East Timor as well as being the main government hospital in Bali.  RSUP has 754 beds and employs 2,115 staff, of whom approximately 984 are nurses. The hospital offers a range of acute care services consistent with the range of services that would be expected of a major tertiary hospital in Australia.  However, the quality of the care is variable and not of the standard that would be expected of an equivalent Government hospital in a Western country.

Australian Vietnam Volunteers Resource Group (AVVRG) was formed by a group of Vietnam Veterans who were concerned about their observations of the ongoing devastation of the social and physical infrastructure in Vietnam as a consequence of a prolonged war and the country's 20 year isolation from the West. This was particularly evident in the former Province of Phuoc Tuy (renamed the Ba Ria/Vung Tau Province in 1975), which during the war contained the Australian Task Force Base at Nui Dat and the Australian Logistic Support Group and RAAF support units at Vung Tau.

The Vic Health Education Team is located in Melbourne, Australia. The Team began by implementing a Nurse Conference in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) in 2003.  The continuation of the Conferences has evolved to include several other health care professions. All Team members fund their own visit costs.  Currently, the Health Education Team engages with eight major hospitals in HCMC, with each hospital having a specialty health care interest relationship with the Team. In contrast to hospitals in Australia, Vietnamese hospitals are huge.  Many have in excess of 1000 beds.  For example, Cho Ray has 1700 beds with approximately 3000 patients sharing those beds.  One of the maternity hospitals had 51,000 births last year (the Royal Women's’ Hospital in Melbourne had 6,000).

 “Whilst they had been away, our new unit was finished and the patients were moved by stretcher to their new hospital beds with proper hospital mattresses, bedside lockers, air conditioning, freshly painted walls and a new floor! I had taken photos of the new ward and had shown the families and patients their new 'home', and gave them the opportunity to choose their beds. Eve wanted to be close to the door and I asked her to choose the beds for her friends. There was so much excitement amongst the families and staff during the move! Big smiles and laughter! Everyone felt truly energized. The visiting teams of doctors just could not believe it! They were so complimentary about the unit and many said it was like walking in to a western ward again and in complete contrast to the haitian medical environment. All I can say is that a lot of work was involved by an amazing team of people, both haitian and english (here and in the UK), and it really is lovely to see all our efforts put into practice! It genuinely is a good feeling to know that we are making a difference here. Of course there are teething problems to anything new and we have certainly had them. There will be more in the future, but at the end of the day, everyone is trying to do their best - given the circumstances.