Equipped to save
Reserve commitment

Heartfelt: Capt Keith Brennan and WO2 Michael Clarke treat a girl for pneumonia at the Dili Hospital. Photo by Cpl Damian Shovell

By Cpl Damian Shovell

FIVE Army medical personnel on Op Spire have helped evacuate an East Timorese woman from Dili to Melbourne for urgent medical treatment.

Capt Keith Brennan a reserve doctor from 8CSSB, and his emergency resuscitation team at Dili’s UN Hospital helped organise the transfer of the 22- year-old woman last month, from a local Dili clinic where she had received basic treatment for her chronic tuberculosis.

Capt Brennan said the UN and the Rotary organisations paid for the live-saving flights from Dili after an Australian doctor from Melbourne flew in to assess the condition of heart patients and confirmed the woman needed critical treatment.

“She either had to get treatment or she would have died,” Capt Brennan said.

He said the woman, named Maria, also suffered anaemia and malnutrition and spent several days building strength before she underwent the procedure.

Melbourne’s East Timorese community made contact with Maria and Capt Brennan’s team, which is on 24-hour call to respond to initial resuscitation and stabilisation of UN personnel.

The team also interacted closely with the Dili Hospital where it conducts weekly rounds at the paediatric ward and also at Dr Dan Murphy’s clinic where it first treated the woman, taking blood and removing fluid from her lungs.

Capt Brennan said the pace for his team during Op Spire had been moderate, but not without serious incident, including treating injured from a motor vehicle accident on their first day in country, and later an East Timorese soldier who died from as a result of an accidental shooting.

He said the team based at the UN Hospital, was equipped with a full emergency and operating room where it could perform most emergency procedures.

The hospital also has UN nursing staff, an anaesthetist and surgeon, and has an ambulance for use in Dili, or employs the RAAF aeromedical team for tasks outside the city.