MEDICAL MISSION TO NIGERIA
by Dan Wagner
Seven medical professionals representing the World Health Mission traveled to Nigeria in western Africa from Nov. 2-18, 1996. The team did volunteer medical work at a hospital in a rural town called Bauchi, in the eastern part of the country.Daniel T. Wagner, of Allegheny County, was the first pharmacist invited to join the World Health Mission, who has sponsored a physician only group to Nigeria for the last five years. Dan Wagner is a veteran of many trips abroad, including extensive work done in medicinal plants in the Amazon, Belize and Costa Rica. Wagner is former owner of Medi-Pharmacy in Allison Park, and currently owns Med-Pharm, NutriFarmacy and Wildwood Medical, in Wildwood, Pa.
Mayhem was my first impression as I debarked from the Northwest/KLM 747 airliner in Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria. A swarm of black men, some in conventional western clothes but most in traditional Moslem gowns and hats, gathered around our luggage in the sweltering heat generated by the equatorial sun near the edge of the Sahara Desert. They were eager to carry the load for a "tip," hopefully in American dollars.
Getting past the military guards, who initiated the customs search, was a frightening experience because most carried large guns. I had read that Nigeria had a military dictatorship. In fact, the police personnel and military men we passed at the frequent checkpoints along the main highway we traveled, looked quite foreboding. But we never felt threatened or endangered during our stay in Nigeria, the most populous of all African countries.
Kano is a major northern city with well over one million people. Unbelievable traffic noise and congestion rose from huge marketplaces - dingy microcosms of motorcycles, beat-up automobiles, ragged children, old black men, goats, sheep, chickens and dogs. Such sights and sounds somehow define all that is uncertain and intangible in the Third World.
The next day our team was moved on to Jos, a major city in Nigeria's central plateau district and an overnight stop on our way to Bauchi. Jos offered a cooler climate but little relief from relentless traffic.
An exceptionally wealthy businessman offered us genuine, unexpected hospitality when he invited us to stay in his plush and ornate guest house. He also loaned us two Honda automobiles that greatly facilitated ourjaunt east to the Bauchi Specialist Hospital, where we spent the greater part of our trip engaged in medical work.
Bauchi, four hours east of Jos, was more impoverished than any other cities we had already passed through. Once again, overcrowding was evident and the heat, dust, and auto exhaust made for a very negative first impression.
The hospital's administrators and chief surgeon greeted our team cordially and enthusiastically. But upon touring the facility our first dose of reality was sobering: the hospital had little running water, insufficient quantities of medicines, few drug and medical supplies to choose from, a sub-qualified staff, unsatisfactory sanitary conditions, and an abundance of patients in serious or critical need.
Our challenge was formidable. With each day, the many tasks our team would perform seemed to become overwhelming. Although our efforts were contributing to improved patient care, the immensity of the situation led to a disconcerting feeling we were only scratching the surface. One of the most frustrating aspects was that the government did not provide money for patient care. Patients entering the hospital had to pay for their own food, bedding, medicine, bandages, drugs, gauze, and other products so essential to proper care and healing. In many cases, patients or their families had no money to pay for these necessities and ended up marooned in the worn-out hospital beds waiting for inadequate care during infrequent doctor visits.
The entire area of pharmacy was an exercise in frustration and unbelief. The pharmacy at Bauchi Hospital was poorly stocked because of lack of funding. The total variety of drugs available at the dispensary was probably less than 20. The only antibiotics available were penicillin, ampicillin, and dicloxacillin. No broad-spectrums were in stock. The only drugs used for psychotropic therapy were imipramine and chlorpromazine. I saw many posters advertising the new SSRI, like Prozac and Zoloft, but there was no way the hospital could afford to stock them. Most of the drugs available were to treat local ailments; like malaria, dysentery, parasites, and infections of all kinds.
I soon realized my services as a pharmacy consultant would be severely limited, so I took it upon myself to work in the burn unit - where dozens of children lay in agony from second and third degree burns, mostly from hot water spills. Patients or their families often had no money to spend on bandages, gauze pads, ointments or pain medication. But our American dollars went quite a long way in the Nigerian economy.
It was easy for the team members to "pitch in" to buy much needed drugs and supplies. I purchased most of the drugs from retail pharmacy outlets in town, where selection was much better. I compounded a potent burn lotion that helped to soothe some of the extensive wounds. Our team nurse, Donna Whitlock, from the Univ. of Alabama Medical Center, was immensely helpful in cleaning and debridgement of the burns. We were so pleased that most patients in our ward were discharged by the time we left. The smiling faces of kids and mothers was all the payment we needed.The three OB-GYN doctors did invaluable work in their ward - where they performed surgery, delivered babies, and did extensive training for the residents and nurses. The arrival of the fetal monitor we shipped over was welcomed with enthusiasm and vigor. That Bauchi Hospital will now have such an instrument will greatly facilitate the level of prenatal care and delivery. I was most fortunate to get a chance to teach at the local university in Bauchi. Professor Abubakar Sarnbo, chancellor at Abubaker Tafawa Balewa University, invited me to lecture to the biology, biochemistry and botany classes. My topic was 11 pharmacy from the rainforest," which included a slide presentation and lecture on my recent trips to South and Central America. It was very well received by the attentive and most cordial student body.
The arrival of our seven crates of supplies on the final day of our volunteer services at Bauchi Specialist Hospital generated much fanfare and excitement. The roughly $40,000 shipment - long delayed at the customs office - was a lifeline of medical equipment, drugs, vitamins, surgical and medical supplies, medical books and journals, and even toys and candy.
For me, the mission to Nigeria was a life and spiritual adventure that will live in my heart and mind for a long, long time. Despite the evident sorrow, poverty, and misery of this typical Third World city, in many ways Bauchi was also a city of joy. The warmth, friendliness, and appreciation of the Nigerian people was most endearing.