International
My experience of tragedy, disasters and war Amer Shoaib
The view through the windscreen of my vehicle is quite alarming. There are six armed men in the back of a pick-up in front of me, all carrying AK47 automatic weapons.
Amer Shoaib is a Consultant Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgeon at Manchester Royal Infirmary and Trafford General Hospitals with expertise in conditions affecting the Foot and Ankle. He served with the Royal Army Medical Corps in Bosnia, as well as providing humanitarian support in Haiti after the earthquake and in Syria, treating civilians caught up in the civil war. Amer runs a charity called Orthocycle which runs courses in the UK to train doctors in foot and ankle surgery, and also recycles medical equipment for use in less developed countries.
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ortunately, they are here to protect me. I am returning after a week of operating in Yemen, which is currently enduring a long running civil war. The injuries that I have seen are all related to weapons of war such as bullet injuries and bomb blast injuries. From the moment that we arrived, we could see men and women in the streets with crutches, negotiating their way through an obstacle course that is their daily life on the dusty streets. We are able to offer services not
Rebuilding and saving limbs You may wonder how I got here. Actually, this is exactly what I wanted to do when I went to medical school. Although I wanted to be an orthopaedic surgeon, I also wanted to work in other countries especially in low and middle income countries, treating people who might not otherwise have access to healthcare. I am able to have this alternative life mainly because I am an orthopaedic surgeon, and also because I have been able to take opportunities to gain surgical and non-surgical skills which are necessary to live and work in an austere environment. I specialise in orthopaedic limb reconstruction surgery and foot and ankle surgery. This surgical background equips me with the skills required to deal with the vast majority of limb trauma, and this is what I do in my day job as a Consultant at the Manchester Royal Infirmary.
Figure 1: Being escorted in the Middle East.
38 | JTO | Volume 10 | Issue 01 | March 2022 | boa.ac.uk
locally available because we have brought a lot of surgical equipment with us, as well as some specialist experience in dealing with complex fractures, deformities and bone infection.
Limb reconstruction surgery often involves the use of external fixators rather like a scaffold around an injured limb and I use these on a daily basis in the UK. These are a versatile method for the treatment of trauma, the sequelae of trauma and also ideal for the treatment of acute and chronic war injuries.
