Sinh Cafe bus crash

Brought another patient from Cho Ray Hospital to Singapore on another evacuation. Patient was from Australia on vacation here in Vietnam. Him and his wife were going from Nha Trang to Hoi An by one of the tourist bus companies—one of the long distance bus trips for people who want to travel cheaply. The bus had approximately 16 people, and at about 3:30am crashes head on into another vehicle. Of course no one on the bus was wearing a seat belt. The patient and his wife are themselves in their geriatric years, and unfortunately my patient smashes his face into one wall of the bus, and gets an intraventricular hemorrhage. Poor guy. The patient’s wife tells me many of the people end up going to the hospital, but she is not quite sure of the severity of other people’s injuries, since her husband was so incapacitated. Being the land of no liability….I’m quite sure the tourist company didn’t do much beyond dropping the injured at the hospital. And being the land of poor news transmissions, I’m sure no one knows about this bus accident from one of the biggest tour bus companies in Vietnam!

When I brought the patient and his wife to Singapore, the patient was adequately received by the Emergency department at the National University Hospital, as per the standards of any developed country. Although everyone in Singapore spoke English, unfortunately this did not help our patient from Australia. The patient’s wife apparently has an Australian passport, and has been living in Australia for about 8 years, but only speaks Vietnamese. I had to keep explaining this to every hospital personnel that came in contact with her. They kept asking me, “why doesn’t she speak English if she has been living in Australia?” Funny.