Mission Burkina 3-11 February 2023
Almost 10 years have passed since our friend Dr Silvia Perlangeli put us in touch with Dr Dominique Kiema to set up what is now our primary project in Burkina Faso. Our first steps were finding the right hospital and signing of the mandatory agreements to operate in the country. After that, we could finally carry out SAFE HEART’s first structured cardiac surgery mission in February 2023.
The organisation of each mission is born and developed in the months leading up to the departure. After choosing the date and training the team, we turn our attention to the purchase of air tickets and the selection of patients in collaboration with the heart surgeon at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Tengandogo, Dr Adama Sawadogo. Then, we request the quotations for the valve prostheses and medical equipment for the cardiac surgery. For logistical reasons, we buy at local suppliers.
This mission involved our team from Monday to Thursday, performing two surgeries per day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, for a total of eight patients. Friday was reserved as a ‘parachute’ day in case we could not complete all the scheduled surgeries.
Team
Marco Zanobini
Cardiac Surgeon| Head of Mission
Paola Oddono
Extra Body Perfusion Technician
Lorena Fenoglio
Anesthetist
Alice Vailati
Scrub nurse
Alice Ellena
ICU Nurse
Marta Arzilli
Nurse
Gaia Severgnini
Young Cardiac Surgeon
The departure was scheduled on Friday, with the flight leaving Malpensa at 9:45 am, but the arrival in Ouagadougou, due to several delays, took place at 3:00 am on Saturday night. Tired from the journey and with only a few hours of sleep, late Saturday morning we visited all the patients who had been selected for surgery and set up the week’s operating schedule.
We devoted Sunday to visit the city and to get to know the people who hosted us. Guided by Dr Dominique Kiema, we participated in the celebration of a sung mass in the capital’s cathedral. At the end, we visited an orphanage run by nuns who care for abandoned or orphaned children from 0 to 18 years old, and brought them school supplies. In the afternoon, we went shopping in the local handicrafts market. The evening ended early, as we had to start surgeries on Monday.
We used to wake up at 7 a.m., to have breakfast and transfer to the hospital by minibus. After the first surgery, the cooks at the hospital reserved us a special meal and in the afternoon we performed the second surgery. It ended around 10pm and the minibus took us back to the hotel. For dinner we had discovered a quaint restaurant called ‘La Veranda’ where we had an extraordinary time.
The members of the team still keep in their hearts the memories, the emotions and the joy of the experience and, above all, the Burkinabés. They have such a purity of soul that is impossible to forget.
Nafissatu
During this mission we had an unforgettable experience.
While Dr Marco Zanobini was in the operating room with the team, he noticed that everyone, including hospital officials and even the Minister for Health, was looking at a smartphone. On the screen there were dreadful images of a little girl with an awl stuck at her heart level, perpendicular to the sternum, in a ventricle. This awl, a kind of handicraft tool with a handle, is for separating the braids of the little girls and, apparently, the little girl’s brother had accidentally pressed it on her chest, hitting the heart area.
This was happening hundreds of kilometres away, at the hospital in the capital. We immediately offered to intervene, asking not move the awl in the slightest, let alone removed during the transfer. From that moment on, the daring organisation of a journey of hope began, through roads that were not easy to travel.
In Burkina there is no classic health service as we know it, there health care is completely fee-paying and whatever your problem you must first be able to afford the treatment. However, the Burkinabè are an extraordinary people, they all join together under the leadership of their tribal chief to collect what is needed for the medical treatment of one of their own.
This is what happened to the family of Nafissatu, a farmer father from a village on the far edge of Burkina, some 500 km from the capital where our team was working. Every inhabitant of the tribe participated and thus allowed the little one to travel by ambulance to Ouagadougou. She was a small woman, but with an outstanding courage, who shed just one tear when she saw us, foreigners and whites.
After an incredible journey, Nafissatu arrived at the hospital at 3.00 am, despite the accident occurred at 10.30 am on the previous day.
In the middle of the night, our team confronted with a unique event. Terror and emotion grasped their hearts, but no one, not even for a second hesitated to perform the surgery.
Even today, if you ask them to tell you about it, you will find the same emotion of that night in their voices. Some is still deeply touched.
The surgery was carried out successfully.
I keep some pictures that I would describe as very very strong. I also keep the pictures of Nafissatu dressed up on the day she was discharged from hospital. On that day, someone from above guided all the people involved, including me. Actor and instrument.
– Marco Zanobini