MISSION INTERPLAST ITALY 2006 (Yushu Tibet-China)

Yushu 2006 - in the clinic with Giancarlo Liguori, the mission team leader and vice president of Interplast

Humanitarian surgical mission of Interplast Australia this year, was held in Yushu, the ancient Jakiendo, a small Tibetan town in the region of Quinghay (China), the place, almost isolated from the rest of the world is lost among mountains 5-6000 meters but in green pastures, and never before was now been joined by plastic surgeons in Italy. In fact to reach the Interplast team, organized and directed by the plastic surgeon torinese Giancarlo Liguori and which were part of two doctors Rotarians: the plastic surgeon Daniel Gandini (Pisa) and the pediatrician Franco Garofalo (Moncalieri), had to reach from Milan , Shanghay in China, then still 5 hours of air until the city of Xining, and then had to go ahead even thousand kilometers of mostly dirt road and mountain often at the limit of feasible because of the frequent landslides, (passing passes up to 5000 meters in height where rarefaction of air makes it very difficult breathing), with a journey by land, on a convoy of ambulances and trucks in China, between valleys and upland deserts, lasted 17 hours continuously, over 18 hours to reach by air from Xining Milan.

Even at their destination, having to work for about 10 hours a day at an altitude of almost 4000 meters, the lack of oxygen made necessary by the members of the team, not the risk of mountain sickness, which can lead to cerebral edema and pulmonary drugs as the acetazolamide (a diuretic) and cortisone, the same used by climbers who scale the heights beyond 5-6000 meters

Components of the 2006 team Yushu

Giancarlo Liguori - plastic surgeon, torino, InterplastItaly vice president, team leader of the mission.
Daniele Gandini - plastic surgeon, a division of plastic surgery, hospital Pisan, senior surgeon Interplast, a member of the Rotary Club Pisa (Contact ).
Daniel Boller - plastic surgeon, UO Chir Plastica e Centro Burns, CTO-CRF, Torino
Franco Garofalo - pediatrician, Torino, Rotarian of the Cub in Moncalieri (Torino).
Furthermore, two anesthesiologists (Laura Ceretto and Maurizio Turello) in Turin.
Adolfo Scale, Torino, internist and primary radiology.
Renata Prevost, Interplast secretary and journalist (Milan) and two nurses instruments: Roberta Ferro (CTO, Torino) and Valentina Lancellotti, employed by the general surgery and transplantation of Pisa-Cisanello, whose participation was made possible thanks to the availability of Professor Franco Mosca, director of the department or through the association onlus harp from him directly, (www.fondazionearpa.it ) Has also contributed to the cost of travel towards Yushu.

The mission lasted 22 days and was held in the small town hospital, the Prefecture Hospital. The team, as always happens in the missions of Interplast has used a large amount of equipment required to operate, transported on site (100 cartons of various medical, purchased thanks to donations received from individuals, institutions, associations and clubs in Italian).

For all three missions in Tibet (2004 Shigatse, Lhasa Yushu in 2006 and 2005) there was also a great cooperation from the airline Alitalia, which thanks to its pilot Captain Franco Casadio, friend and member of the organizing committee of Interplast Australia has helped us, advised and supported in long journeys toward China.

In Yushu were operated 120 patients, mostly children, with labiopalatoschisi (so-called cleft lip) major congenital malformation of the face, but also results from burn scar of the face and limbs, all impairments that if you do not make it impossible to operate a normal life and 'inclusion of young patients in their society and in their world of work, with imaginable consequences. The speeches were all successful, without complications; It was mainly populated semi, mostly shepherds that during the summer season bring their herds of yaks (and dzo, the domestic version of the yak in the mountains) to graze on ' plateau and then obtain milk and butter to sell at the market of Yushu.

These are very poor people but fair, living in tents of black yak hair to cook meat and their typical drink made of tea, rancid yak butter and salt (to taste some of us' ... strong, but for their very nutritious) protected by fierce heavywheight Tibetans, with their typical costumes dell'etnia nomad Kampa, colorful, with jewelry of turquoise, coral and amber and large daggers in the belt.

One Sunday morning, only hours of weekly rest of the mission, some local, to thank our hard work, we brought in a valley two hours from the city, in the middle of a green valley perhaps 100 km wide, surrounded by mountains of 5-6000 m, in a monsoon rain, surrounded by herds of yaks to pasture, in a nomad tent in front of the fire to eat boiled mutton carnedi, yogurth of yaks, the beer and butter .... talking and singing with them an unforgettable experience ..

These poor people are completely without health care, with a monthly income estimated at about 250 yuan, that is 25 euro, with no alternative for their children, that the surgeons of Interplast, since there could never afford the thousands of euros which would have to pay (in addition to travel) to make the children in China, the only possibility, we explained the interpreters, would be to sell a large part of the herd of yaks but they are their only sustenance to live.

Yushu In early August, then came a second team of Interplast Australia, headed by its president, Dr. Paolo Morselli Bologna which were part of Professor Gianvittorio Campus, Director of Plastic Surgery of Sassari, Dr. Marino Auteri, plastic surgeon, the anesthetist and Lorraine Pasini