Issue no 1, 2000 -- English edition -- home
Page: -- Contents -- 1, 2, 3, (4), 5, 6, 7, 8
Dr Jarl Magnusson, the Doctor Bank's first jeep-doctor, keeps coming back for new assignments, now latest on the Lake Magadi line among the Masai.
"Much of the poor health is due to the lack of good water. I hope that the Doctor Bank project with water bottles soon starts on a larger scale. I was one of the first to distribute these plastic bottles, but have heard that they are not always used in the way it was intended. This illustrates how important it is to start with carefully selected families, and simple information repeated and followed up. The participation of the local Health Committees is necessary. I hope that this important work can soon be expanded."
Under the supervision of Eila Sundh, from the New Life Mission, the project will be evaluated with the help of Dr Liv Bergqvist, board member of the Rotary Doctor Bank. After that the concept can be developed.
Mr Linyonyi Wamabonga -- a name known to every surgeon from the Doctor Bank who comes to Garissa Hospital in Kenya's northeastern desert region. He has been around since 1989, and the entire time been a support for the surgeons, writes Görel Day-Wilson, Doctor Bank Coordinator in East Africa.
Garissa is a tough region and the Kenyan doctors are often exchanged, but Linyonyi is always there. Linyonyi's broad smile at the airport is infinitely reassuring for the Doctor Bank doctors to meet.
As newly graduated nurse, Linyonyi, then 28, applied to Garissa. The first doctors came from the Rotary Doctor Bank this same year. It was just a short visit that time, and many at the hospital wondered if the European doctors would really bother to come back. However, they did, with Carl-Axel Ekman in the lead.
After lying dormant for five years, the surgeon activities started again.
Linyonyi was also given the opportunity of studying nursing in Sweden and Finland:
"What impressed me most was the attitude of the personnel. They viewed their work with the greatest seriousness. I saw a completely different way to make decisions, where many seemed to be involved in discussions before final decision was taken."
Garissa is one of the world's hottest places. The majority of the population is Somali-he is not. How does he manage to stay on?
"I feel great satisfaction in my work as head of the entire operation ward, and not least because I thanks to the Doctor Bank surgeons get many opportunities to learn more about surgery."
And Linyonyi has become father to a little girl, Monica, now aged 1. She is called Monica after dentist Monica Ekman, who together with husband Carl-Axel are veterans in Garissa. Linyonyi is almost like a Swedish father when he takes care of little Monica while his wife Florence attends a seamstress course in Nairobi.
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Linyonyi Wamabonga, mainstay in Garissa. |
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Dr Knud Sanderud |
The young Dr David Lyrdal, from Östersund, Sweden, son to the Doctor Bank jeep-doctor Flemming Lyrdal, went as "apprentice" in Garissa, Kenya, with the veteran Knud Sanderud, from Larvik, Norway. In an enthusiastic report, he writes:
"Knud's experience was invaluable for a young surgeon like me with limited experience. Thanks to good guidance, this became the most instructive and comprehensive training I have experienced so far. I learned more in a month than what I likely would have in a year at home! In addition, I saw different diseases that I had only read about."
Another young doctor, Lena Steen, from Värnamo, Sweden, came to Garissa after David Lyrdal, and she assisted another of the Doctor Bank's experienced surgeons, Göran Hambraeus, from Bjärred, Sweden. She was just as enthusiastic:
"I want to thank Dr Hambraeus for giving me such valuable instruction in surgery, and the Doctor Bank for the fine opportunity for young doctors to work in Africa. I feel like another person with wider views and renewed inspiration."