Rush hour for the Kings Heath medics in Afghanistan
Jun 4 2009 by Paul Bradley, Birmingham Post
As hundreds of British soldiers were embroiled in fierce fighting at Taliban strongholds in southern Afghanistan, reporter Paul Bradley joined Kings Heath 202 Field Hospital as they prepared for the inevitable casualties.
Two ambulances pull up at the front doors of the hospital, the doors are flung open and a team of Birmingham medics spring into action.
One of the wounded British soldiers has been shot but is still conscious, the other has been electrocuted and can barely walk, the pain obvious on his sunburnt face.
A wheelchair and a trolley are brought out to transport the injured men from the windswept desert into the sterile Emergency Department of Camp Bastion’s hospital.
Watching over proceedings is 62-year-old Lt Colonel Duncan Phimister, who is responsible for the medical unit.
In front of him, two teams of medics quickly evaluate the situation and the two soldiers are taken into separate trauma units.
The electrocuted patient is given an X-ray and within seconds the team is tending to his arm, believed to be dislocated. The wounded soldier is sitting up in bed just a few metres away and the doctors are telling him just how lucky he was.
During a battle a Taliban fighter shot him in the shoulder. Miraculously, the bullet passed through his limb, missing all bones, major arteries and tendons, before exiting.
A third soldier, who was being brought back by helicopter from front-line fighting, has died.
Major Moira Kane, nurse in charge of the Emergency Department, said: “There is a huge rush of adrenalin when we know that a serious injury is coming in.
“Everybody gets ready and I have to make sure there are sufficient stocks in each trauma bay as well as working closely with the consultant. It really is incredible in this hospital that we can get somebody off the helicopter, through our doors into the Emergency Department and then into theatre in less than 14 minutes. That’s something you simply never see at home.”
Trauma injuries at the hospital are so frequent and severe that it is said that a week working in the camp’s field hospital is the equivalent of one year’s experience in the NHS.
But there are huge peaks and troughs in the system, especially for the Emergency Department, who are the first port of call once the flying doctors reach them with the casualty. For hours on end, clinicians sit around waiting for something to happen. But then everything could happen at once, as injured soldiers pour in from firefights across Helmand Province.
Lt Col Gary Ward, an emergency medicine consultant from Bromsgrove, said: “It’s a different rhythm of life here. We sleep when we can and work when we are needed.
