Praneel KumarPNG Health Project2016 Block 10

The Kiunga hospital placement during the final year of my medical school at Griffith University was an eye-opening experience.

I arrived with preconceptions of Australia’s closest neighbour to help prepare myself for the inevitable culture shock: poorly resourced hospitals with an even poorer health literate population who were living amongst thick rainforests.

PNG did not disappoint.

The Kiunga hospital was fast running out of much needed antimalarials, with some patients having to go without medication until the next shipment arrived.

Praneel KumarPNG Health Project2016 Block 10Patients had a different cultural understanding of illness and the meaning of symptoms, with some blaming the finger at ‘black magic’ and seeking retribution against those blamed for casting these spells.

The town was situated many hundred of kilometres from the nearest urban centre, separated by a dense blanket of green through which the Fly River snaked a winding course.

But what I had not prepared for was the resilience of the locals: the young pregnant woman who was about to deliver so she walked bare-foot on the gravel road for kilometres to give birth at the hospital.

Praneel KumarPNG Health Project2016 Block 10A grandmother with large bowel obstruction who rode overnight on a dinghy to seek care at Kiunga. The nomadic man with urinary retention who walked for days so we could relieve his pain.

These stories were repeated day after day.

I remember feeling undeserving of the respect locals gave to hospital staff because too often we could not give the standard of care I was used to providing.

I remember thinking that if only some of the patients lived across the Torres Strait, they would still be alive.

And I feel that the hardest part was not living in Kiunga but leaving it, learning to practice back home, knowing what I had left behind.

Praneel KumarPNG Health Project

2016 Block 10

Sincere thanks to:• QRME staff (including Kaitlyn, Julie and Megan)

for orientation and organising the placement• Graeme Hill for supervising the students (and

showing us the local gems such as the pub and swimming pool)

• OK Tedi Mining for arranging flights• Hope 4 Health for donating medical supplies

through its International Electives Grant