Amputations, stitches in serious wounds, C-sections on pregnant women and operations on burn victims, with pain beyond human limits
The little girl cried out in pain and called out “mommy, mommy” as a nurse stitched up her head wound without anesthesia, which is not available at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
This was one of the worst moments nurse Abu Emad Hassanein remembers as he describes the battle for hospital health staff to cope with an unprecedented influx of wounded and a shortage of anesthetic drugs since the war in Gaza broke out on October 7.
“Sometimes we give them sterile gauze (to bite) to reduce the pain»Hassanein explained.
“We know that the pain they feel is greater than anyone can imagine, beyond what someone their age could bear“, he added referring to the children, such as the girl with the head injury.
Nemer Abu Tair, a middle-aged man, went to al-Shifa Hospital to have his gauze changed and an antiseptic applied to his back wound, which was caused by an airstrike. He stated that he was not given anesthesia when the wound was sutured. “I recited the Quran until they finished“, he said.
Mohammad Abu Selmeyah, director of al Shifa Hospital, said that, when a large number of injured people arrive, there is no other option than to give them first aid on the floor, without the administration of anaesthetic.
“It’s painful for the medical team. It’s not simple. Either the patient will suffer or dieAbu Selmeyah pointed out.
As an example he referred to explosion at al-Ahli al-Arab hospital on October 17, when around 250 wounded arrived at the same time at al-Shifa, which has only 12 operating theatres. “If we had waited to operate on them one by one, we would have missed many of the wounded,” he explained. “We have had to perform operations on the floor without general anesthesia, or using simple anesthesia or painkillers, in order to save livesAbu Selmeyah emphasized.
Among the operations that have been performed under these conditions by the doctors at Al Shifa Hospital are amputation fingers or limbs, stitches in serious injuries and the treatment of serious ones burnshe clarified.
“Some operations were performed without anesthesia, including C-sections on pregnant women, while we were forced to do the same on burn victims.“, for his part, described Dr. Mohammad Zakut, at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, in the southern part of the Gaza Strip,
Especially by the beginning of the war, anesthetic supplies had been completely exhausted by the time aid trucks entered the enclave.
Zakut pointed out that the health staff did their best to ease the patients’ pain by using other, milder drugsbut this was not enough.
“It is not the ideal solution for a patient in the operating room who we want to operate under full anesthesia,” he emphasized.
During the first 12 days of the war, entry into the Gaza Strip was not allowed any help. On October 21, a first convoy of trucks passed through the Rafah border crossing, on the enclave’s border with Egypt. Since then several convoys have entered Gaza, but the UN and international aid organizations stress that the aid passing through the enclave is not enough to prevent a humanitarian disaster.
Zakut added that, although shortages of anesthetics at his hospital have been reduced thanks to humanitarian aid, there are still serious shortages at Al Shifa Hospital and the Indonesian hospital located in the northern part of the Gaza Strip, where the shelling is heavy.
Source :Skai
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