Mission in Benin. April, 2016
It was Friday at 5 pm April 2016 when we all met in the Barajas airport, Madrid; volunteers, relatives, companions who had come to say goodbye, plus a group of journalists who accompanied us throughout our mission. The surgical team was made up by three surgeons, José Antonio Pascual, Laura Vega, Libertad Martín and one anaesthetist Gloria Hernández; also Morge Parise who has put us in contact with the “Infancia y Cirugía en Dangbo” association. We carried with us 4 bags full of surgical material for the mission and some gifts and sweets for the children. The journey was long, and after 5 hours travelling and a stop in Casa Blanca we reached Cotonú, the second most important city after the capital Porto Novo. The nuns from the“Albergue del Amor Redentor” were waiting for us there. A car took us from the airport to Dangbo to the house where we would sleep the next six nights. It was very close to the hospital. We arrived at 9 am on Saturday 23 April, and so we had a couple of hours to rest before starting work. A number of patients were waiting for us, and we proceeded to see patients and to program the operation rooms for the week.
The hospital was divided in various sections, one for patients who had to spend the night there, another for births, another for operation theaters, and then a small building with kitchen and dining room. There were severa other buildings but not in use. In the hospital the nun in charge was Mama Oportune, and she was also the most knowledgeable. Mama Ruffine and Gabin helped us in the operation theater for the preparation and shifting of patients.
We treated many patients. The ones programmed for operation were inguinal hernias, hidrocels, eventrations and skin tumors. Some of the patients presented complicated pathologies, breast cancer, testicles cancer, bowel fistulae which we could not treat, as postoperation care would be highly complex and we were not to stay there sufficient time to supply it.
On Sunday we also worked in the morning, and in the afternoon we had a little time to see the surroundings. They took us by car to the Oueme river, we went in a boat, we visited several villages, saw wonderful landscapes and could appreciate a little of the culture and way of life of the inhabitants.
We operated on five continuous days: 45 operations and 38 patients: 35 inguinal hernias, 2 hidrocels, 1 criptoquidia and 7 local procedures. The operation theatre was fairly well equipped with surgical material besides the one we had brought with us. The first two days were the hardest ones till we got used to the heat and managed to handle the air condition as we were sweating the whole time. The first day we went slower, we stopped in order to go to hour house to eat and we left some patients programmed for the afternoon, so that we worked till late at night The second day we changed our approach, we placed a partition in the operation room so that in one side we had local anaesthetic cases and in the other those needed special care in the anesthesia. For greater speed we replaced lunch at home by a quick omelet sandwich between patient and patient. In that way we had some more time in the afternoon to operate and finish earlier. About 7 we went to the hotel were the newsmen were, with luck, we could get a wifi and talk with our friends and family. We took some beers, told our experiences of the day and finally we took supper together.
The five days in the operation room passed very quickly in spite of being so hard, and before we realized it we were back at the airport in our way home.
This work has given us a different professional formation, the satisfaction of helping people in need, besides the enrichment of other cultures very different from our own and the strengthening our likns within the group. We could sum up it all as an unforgettable, unique and extraordinary experience.