Operation Vietnam: A New Zealand Surgical First by Michael Shackleton

Author:Michael Shackleton [Shackleton, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780947522216
Google: AOUFwgEACAAJ
Publisher: Otago University Press
Published: 2004-11-15T00:07:45.595541+00:00

11: Kontum and Pat Smith

One wet and miserable Sunday afternoon in late September, I was contacted by Dr Patricia Smith from Kontum, in the highlands. She explained that she was not a surgeon but that she had a small hospital with some facilities and had just admitted an elderly Montagnard man who had been gored in the right temple by a water buffalo. He was conscious and seemed rational, though it was obvious his brain had been exposed and was apparently protruding a little above his right ear. I gathered the accident had occurred that morning and the bleeding, by a lucky chance, had stopped. Dr Smith asked if I could give her some advice and surgical assistance. It was quite a challenge but the main problem was how to get there. I suggested that she apply a simple saline dressing and bandage the wound without attempting to clean it up in any way. I also asked her to give him some antibiotic immediately.

My next move was to approach the American duty officer at the MAAG about the possibility of being flown to Kontum urgently since road transport was out of the question. At times like this the American army was at its best. The duty officer took me to a fresh-faced, well set-up young lieutenant, who was the pilot of a Cessna spotting plane. Without the slightest hesitation he said, 'Sure, no sweat – but we will have to wait for the weather to improve.' By early next morning, the tropical storm had passed and the skies were clear. After checking that our Montagnard patient was stable, I set out on what promised to be an exciting trip.

We flew at almost zero altitude the whole way – to avoid sniper fire, I was told. I was able to make a close inspection, from what seemed to be tree-top height, of the rainforest and the rice paddies. It was hedge-hopping stuff, but even though we flew over the occasional hamlet, we failed to see any evidence of Viet Cong, neither were we fired on as far as I could tell. After an exhilarating flight we made a safe landing on the air strip at Kontum where a cheerful Pat Smith was waiting in her rather dilapidated but functional jeep. She took me straight to her hospital where I found to my astonishment she had an anaesthetist ready to go. Tony Brown was young, English, and a St Thomas's Hospital graduate who was working on a solo basis in Pleiku, also in the highlands. We did not waste any time as I assessed and operated on a docile, uncomplaining 56-year-old patient from a local Montagnard village. The head wound was tidied up and the bony defect in his temple covered by a flap of muscle tissue. He went on to make a good recovery, but I had to return to Qui Nhon the same day and was fortunate enough to hitch a ride in a Huey helicopter with Colonel Anido from Qui Nhon, who sat beside me silently reading a paperback novel for the entire journey.

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