Nigeria: A Surgeon and two patients share their stories
For the past 11 years, armed conflict in north-east Nigeria has left thousands of people maimed. In a region with limited health facilities with roughly half of its facilities closed or destroyed, injured people often face a serious challenge accessing healthcare services. Our mobile surgical team (MST) in Maiduguri supports the Borno State Specialist Hospital in providing emergency surgical care.
Working alongside the local medical staff at the hospital, they provide critical medical care, usually stemming from violence in the region, and other severe medical emergencies. Since 2015, the team has carried out more than 24,000 operations.
In the videos below, Prof. Kenneth Ozoilo, a consultant surgeon with the MST shares his experience as a surgeon while Kana Mustapha and Zara Amma Kolo talk about their experience getting treated by our surgeons after they were injured in two separate attacks. Their stories provide insights into the suffering armed conflicts inflicts on people and the crucial role war surgeons and nurses play in helping injured victims to heal.
Professor Kenneth Ozoilo, a surgeon with the Mobile Surgical Team speaks on his experience and describes some challenges faced by healthcare workers like himself in discharging their duty.
Kana Kura Mustapha is a 32-year-old kola-nut seller in Maiduguri. He was treated by the mobile surgical team after he and his family were attacked. He spent 80 days in the hospital.
"When I saw that my bones were outside, I totally lost hope. I never thought I would survive." 29-year-old Zara Amma Kolo shares her story of how ICRC surgeons saved her life after she was attacked in her home in February 2019.