Healing hands hard at work

Army Reserve surgeon Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Ellis applies the final dressing to the amputated leg of an elderly Indonesian woman in the Anzac Field Hospital, Banda Aceh. In civilian life Andrew is an orthopaedic trauma surgeon at the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney.

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Army Reserve surgeon Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Ellis applies the final dressing to the amputated leg of an elderly Indonesian woman in the Anzac Field Hospital, Banda Aceh. In civilian life Andrew is an orthopaedic trauma surgeon at the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney.

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Army Reserve surgeon Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Ellis applies a skin graft to the foot of an elderly Indonesian woman in the Anzac Field Hospital, Banda Aceh. In civilian life Andrew is an orthopaedic trauma surgeon at the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney.

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By Corporal Cameron Jamieson - filed 28 January 2005

As an Army Reserve surgeon, Lieutenant-Colonel Andrew Ellis from Willoughby has often answered the call for duty.

A veteran of operations in East Timor, Bougainville and the Solomon Islands, he was recently called to serve in Indonesia as part of Defence's assistance mission to Indonesia following the Boxing Day earthquake and tsunami.

But this time he would be afloat - onboard HMAS Kanimbla.

In civilian life, Lieutenant-Colonel Ellis is an orthopaedic trauma surgeon at the Royal North Shore Hospital and a senior lecturer in orthopaedic trauma at Sydney University.

He had just finished five days of on-call duty over the Christmas break and was preparing to go on two weeks holiday with his family when he was contacted and asked to deploy with HMAS Kanimbla's medical team.

The Navy team were tasked with providing medical facilities for Defence personnel who may become sick or injured during Operation Sumatra Assist, allowing the Army's field hospital in Banda Aceh to focus on its humanitarian aid task.

The workload for the ship-bound surgeons was thankfully fairly light, so when the opportunity arose for Lieutenant-Colonel Ellis to go ashore and help at the Anzac Field Hospital for a few days he leapt at the chance.

The field hospital is located in the ruins of the Banda Aceh hospital, which is slowly being cleaned and repaired.

Straight away he was assigned to the refurbished operating theatre to conduct follow-up operations on victims of the natural disaster.

Despite his considerable operational service, Lieutenant-Colonel Ellis found the situation in Banda Aceh totally unlike anything he has seen before.

"The scale of devastation is amazing. I feel very sympathetic to what the people of Banda Aceh have gone through," he said.

"To lose such a significant amount of life is beyond my experience and imagination."

Working at the field hospital also gave him a chance to see the good work the Australian and New Zealand soldiers have done to make the ruined Banda Aceh Hospital operational again.

" I think the soldiers are doing a fantastic job," he said.

"They're continuously working hard in very poor circumstances.

"The amount of work they have done along with Indonesian Armed Forces personnel to refurbish the hospital, to get the surgical facility running and care for the very sick patients has required them to work long hours.

"Quite frankly, I'm amazed at what has been achieved here - it's a great tribute to the Anzac Field Hospital."