the neurosurgeon & one single light bulb

The 9 month old little girl who had travelled all the way from the Gambia to Guinea lay on the worn mattress upon the operating table in the rudimentary operating theater. Although there was paint chipping off the walls, the OR theater appeared clean, sort of. Today the electricity was working and I prayed it would work for the duration of the little one’s operation. The OR lights were broken. I was told they hadn’t worked in years, so the surgeon worked diligently by the light from one single light bulb connected to an extension cord that was carefully strung across the ceiling above the patient. There was no vital sign equipment available to monitor the baby’s oxygen saturation, blood pressure, pulse, or temperature during the operation. The room was hot, sweat dripped down my forehead. The surgeon worked diligently to place the shunt from the baby’s head to her peritoneal area, to drain off the excess fluid that was surrounding her brain. I prayed for safety for the baby as the emergency drug cabinet in the room was sparsely stocked, the suction set was broken, the oxygen was in a huge cylinder with questionable administration sets, and the surgeon had just leaned over to tell me another supply he would like is working coagulation-cauterization equipment, the equipment needed in case a patient starts to bleed.



I selfishly hovered beneath the tiny air-condition in the room trying to cool myself and comprehend that I was in an operating room, in one of the National Hospitals of Guinea, with a neurosurgeon, watching a brain surgery, and all the surgeon had to guide his hands was one small little light bulb. All the supplies he needed for the surgery were donated in a little bag, the surgeon got no more and no less than the quantity in the donated bag. If he had needed one extra piece of gauze, it would not have been available.


For some reason, as I stood in the operating room watching the surgeon’s technique, my mind drifted back to another surgery, in another operating room, that took place the same week, five years ago. The patient that lay on that operating table was scared to death, but was being operated on in one of the finest hospitals in her country, with access to any and every type of equipment the surgeons or nurses would have needed. When she was told she had a brain tumor, she wondered if all her hopes and dreams were vanishing and never going to become reality. She cried for days and days, leading up to the operation, she ate every kind of chocolate in site “eating her feelings,” and hoping to wake up from the bad dream, then she cried some more. Thankfully, without any complications, her highly skilled neurosurgeons, successfully removed her brain tumor. And almost five years later, to the day, that same girl stood in an African operating room… hovering under a tiny air conditioner… praying over the little one on the table, undergoing brain surgery, hoping the baby and others like her would be able to grow up and live their dreams…Thanks to God, I am living my dreams…volunteering as a nurse in Africa with Mercy Ships… and I pray God gives Mercy Ships wisdom to see how they can partner with and help the little children in Guinea needing brain surgeries… by helping the neurosurgeon who operated by one single light bulb.