Facility needs resources

By LULU MARK
MANY referrals from the Bomai sub-health centre in remote Karamui-Nomane, Chimbu, to Kundiawa Hospital, are unable to get to the provincial capital and as a result, die, a local health official says.
Officer-in-charge Jessy Simon said many of the referrals were for treatable conditions but the health centre did not have the expertise or resources to provide adequate health care.
“Whatever we can do, we do it to the best of our abilities with what is available and then we write the referral letter for the patient,” he said.
“If a plane comes in time and the patient can afford to, they go to town.
“Most hold onto their referral letters until they die knowing they would have had a fighting chance if only they could go to town.
“A referral letter is like a note, a way of us telling them that there is nothing we could do anymore.”
Tom Kui has bags of peanut in the store house and was praying a plane would arrive on time to take his daughter Anna to town for further medical checks and treatment.
The sound of a plane making its way to land at the Bomai airstrip after a couple of months meant the help Kui and his family have been praying for had finally arrived.
It was Jan 23 and Kui’s daughter Anna had been sick for a while.
She was admitted at the health centre with a referral letter for more than a week.
It would take five days to walk over mountains, across rivers and through forests to Gumine to get on a vehicle to Kundiawa town which Anna was in no condition to make.
According to Simon, Anna suffered from prolonged chronic abdominal pain and visited the health centre earlier where she was admitted for a week.
She was discharged with supplies of antibiotics but while at the house, her condition worsened resulting in her fainting so she was brought back to the health centre.
Her condition deteriorated.
Simon and his colleagues did the best they could with the medical supplies they had but they could not provide her the proper diagnosis and treatment she needed.
Her only hope was to get to a hospital for further examination and treatment.
Kui and others living in places that are inaccessible by road know too well that the opportunity for a patient to be transferred to town to seek further medical treatment comes once in a while and they have to grab it with both hands when it arrives.
The North Coast Aviation plane that morning brought corrugated roofing iron sheets for a church at the station.
In order for planes to go in with what is termed the “front load”, there has to be the “back load” which can be cargo or people because a trip to a place that remote is expensive.
There were four passengers which included Anna and her mother and 25 peanut bags of which 17 were Kui’s which made up the backload.
The peanuts were bought by the pilot that brought the plane in.
The plane fare for a flight was K280 so from the K1,020 received from the 17 peanut bags K560 went to the fare and K460 was given to Anna and her mother for the medical expense and other costs while in town.
As the plane took off, Kui, a deacon of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, prayed that his daughter would receive the medical treatment she needed and get better and return to the village soon.
Kui’s wife is a deaconess and they have seven children, two boys and five girls with Anna the sixth born.
Kui volunteers at the health centre as a security and grounds man.
“I was worried when she fell sick and could not get treated here,” he said.
“I cried when the plane left because I am worried about how they will manage in town.
“But, I know she is going to get help and that calms me.
“I can only pray for her and her mother until their return home.”
After almost three weeks in town, seeking treatment in Kundiawa, Anna and her mother returned to Bomai last week.
From Kundiawa, the vehicle dropped them at Gumine and they walked to Bomai.
Kui is grateful to God and the pilot who bought the peanut bags enabling his daughter to seek medical help in town.
“I will continue to plant peanut so that I can have something for emergencies,” he said.
“As a family, we work together in the gardens to plant peanut and other vegetables so when someone is in need such as my daughter we help each other.
“There is coffee, cocoa and other vegetables that grow well but we mainly focus on peanut as our cash crop because it is easier for us to carry and walk to the main road.”
A bag of peanut can be sold for as much as K120 in town and they make around K200 at the market which is a significant amount for rural people. But the walk is too long and a person can only carry one bag.
Needless to say, the people’s biggest need in Bomai is a road connecting them to Gumine and Kundiawa.