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.

Perth Evacuation

The patient spent about 7 days in our clinic, awaiting her medical escort team to bring her back home to Australia. Due to the nature of booking a medical stretcher with oxygen availability on a commercial airplane, it took about 4 days to reserve the flight plans. Flight was from HCMC to Hong Kong; HK to Perth/Australia. The patient remained stable throughout the flight.

Perth itself is a very windy city. I stayed there for only 24 hours, and then got right back onto the plane to fly right back home. Return was a bit longer. From Perth to Sydney; Sydney to Hong Kong; HK to HCMC. Total travel time on the return trip = 22 hours on economy seating. Quite a long flight and little sleep. It's not fun sleeping upright in a chair. And then upon my return to HCMC, I was expected to return to work and see patients right away. I'm not compensated in any way for these evacuations--I get paid the same whether I carry out no evacuations or 10!

Use of yahoo messenger came in handy on this trip. I was able to keep in touch with people instantaneously wherever I found an internet connection while traveling; be it in the hotel or several of the airports.

While browsing in Hong Kong for international electric plug adapters, I couldn't purchase the item since I grabbed the wrong credit card before leaving, and had only my expired card on hand. So I tried to take a few snapshots of the items at the store in Hong Kong, and the store clerk gets all suspicious and tells me no pictures of his store items. Freaky salesperson. How do these people think taking pictures of items in their store will hurt their business? Afraid I will price compare and buy somewhere else? He wants to trick me into buying at his silly rip-off prices? Backward business ethics.

Interesting note; while shopping for souvenir gifts for the poor souls working in my clinic that have never left vietnam, the Sydney gift shop sold small leather pouches that were labeled as kangaroo scrotum. That's a good one!

The nurse I traveled with this time is quite an unschooled 'traveler.' He would walk with me through the airport, with his small carry on suitcase with the zipper partially busted open. His carry-on seemed so stuffed full of items. And then the guy finds out later that he can't find his old point and shoot film camera. He had taken a whole roll of pictures of his first trip outside of Vietnam, and then loses the camera at the end of the trip somewhere in the Hong Kong airport. What a riot.

It's Oktoberfest 2005

It’s Oktoberfest 2005 Vietnam! I’m one of the doctors covering the event at the “First Aid Station”. My clinic volunteers its services to provide a nurse and physician for each of the 3 day event span. Not so sure it’s as altruistic as it sounds, since it just facilitates use of our clinic when somebody gets hurt, which can potentially turn into something more serious.

The event started at 6pm at one of the 5-star hotels in HoChiMinh City. Suppose to last until 11:30pm. I arrived at 7:30pm. Our nurse had arrived earlier to setup our area for first aid. When I arrive, it seems to be quite a joyous occasion. Maybe 300-450 people present? Predominantly foreigner expats. Some local Vietnamese, here through their work connections or social relationships. I recognize so many faces. Clinic patient faces. In just a 20 minute stroll through the rooms, and I see maybe 15 people that have been my patient at one time or another. Everyone’s having a good time; half of them are with red, drunken faces and a swaying gait. Not too far into the night, the live band plays happy German folk music; and the central live music room has everyone standing on the tables and chairs, with an oversized mug of beer in hand—bouncing up and down to the melodious traditional German music. I kept wondering how soon it would be before someone fell off the table and literally broke a leg.

I left at midnight, and surprisingly enough, no one had a heart attack, or fell in a drunken stupor and needed stitches! I heard last year that one person attending the event had a heart attack and was evacuated to Bangkok. Wouldn’t surprise me. With all the free flowing greasy, fatty German food flowing around—just what the doctor ordered for that last bit of cholesterol to clog the heart. A lot of drunken people though, walking with red faces and a swaying gait. The few people who came to the first aid station wanted some preventative hangover medicine. Have a few other people who wanted a free medical consultation for their current medical problems. Makes for an interesting conversation when a patient is moderately drunk but still prudent about remaining polite. A few drunken people tried to flirt with the female nurse. Tsk Tsk Tsk.