Iraq lacks facilities and expertise in emergency medicine
Bassim Irheim Mohammed Al Sheibani, lecturer physician1…
Iraq has a population of over 26 million and more than 180 hospitals, but only a handful have emergency departments. As the violence escalates, and we attempt daily to deal with the devastating effect of multiple deaths and severe injury, the reality is that we cannot provide any treatment for many of the victims. Emergency medicine in Iraq has never developed to meet such unprecedented demand. Emergency departments are staffed by doctors who do not have the proper experience or skills to manage emergency cases.
Read the rest. Grim.
They certainly need some serious help, but the question becomes one of “what could one doc really do?”
You could drop a boarded ER doc in that environment, and he could do quite a bit of stabilization. He could do a zillion chest tubes, reduce a zillion fractures, and teach basic self-aid and buddy care, but without equipment (vents, abx, etc) and surgeons to back him up, how many patients would really survive?
It’s not just the people that make the difference, it’s the entire trauma system, from EMS to the ICU. There’s a reason why the US military takes that entire system with them when we deploy.
Wow, that is sad. Makes me glad I live here.