Cambodia and Helicopters

Greetings friends,

In case you’re wondering what I (Josh) have been doing over the past month, here is a little update:

About three weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go to Cambodia on a medical humanitarian assistance exercise. The opportunity came up when 7th Fleet (the people in charge of all Navy activities in eastern Asia) decided to do a MEDCAP (Medical Civil Action Project or something like that) in conjunction with the first US Navy ship visiting Cambodia in over 30 years. The last time the US Navy and Marines were in Cambodia was a bloody rescue of a Merchant Marine crew captured by the Khmer Rouge in 1975 (see http://www.usmm.org/mayaguez.html for more history). Needless to say, we didn’t leave Cambodia on the best terms! Consequently, this port visit was a big deal for the Navy and for USS GARY, the frigate that would be visiting.
However, up until two weeks before the exercise, there was no doctor lined up to participate in the exercise – which kind of threw a monkey wrench into the MEDCAP idea. Hearing about this opportunity, I emailed the 7th Fleet Surgeon (the head doctor) and offered to help. Long story short, 7th Fleet ended up paying for me and a dentist and surgical tech to fly to Phnom Penh, Cambodia to do some medicine! After two weeks of frantic planning, everything was worked out. There would be one doctor (me!), two dentists (LT Mooney from the aircraft carrier, KITTY HAWK, and CAPT Craft from the US Public Health Service), and medical assistants from the KITTY HAWK and USS GARY. Additionally, the Royal Cambodian Navy (RCN) provided a doctor, some medical assistants and nurses. The US Embassy arranged our transportation, translators and lodging (and did a great job!).

Day 1: Flew into Phnom Penh, stayed at sweet hotel, met rest of team.
Day 2: Drove 4 hours to Sihanoukville, set up shop in a brand new Buddhist temple. We were supposed to work at the little clinic across the street, but the temple was still being finished (they were doing beautiful paintings on the walls as we worked) so it was available and much bigger! Some local women swept it out and the kids mopped it with rags so it was pretty clean. We had dinner at a local Cambodian restaurant – ate on the beach with the chairs in the sand. The USPHS dentist’s wife is Cambodian, so she made sure we only ate the best, most authentic food while we were there. The shrimp and fish were amazing! Stayed in another sweet hotel (thank you US Embassy!).
Day 3: No more playtime! Today, we went to work. My corpsman (enlisted medical provider with over a year of training) did triage and I saw patients. I trained some of the GARY crew to run the pharmacy and they did a great job! Unfortunately, the local doctor and the RCN doctor didn’t want to see patients independently – they all wanted to work with me. So I ended up having the RCN doctor (LCDR Yadeth) as my translator. Together, my corpsman and I saw over 60 patients the first day, some of them with interesting diseases. I had to send some pictures back to Yokosuka for specialty advice when I wasn’t able to make one of the diagnoses (thanks Dr. Norwood!). Although the media was quite engaged with the entire port visit (there were other things going on besides the MEDCAP – volunteer service by the GARY crew, recreational events and meet and greets with diplomats), this day was the big media circus for the MEDCAP (there were around 70 members of the press!). I did 3 or 4 interviews that day, all quite ineloquent. I’m told I was on TV and elsewhere but I haven’t seen it yet. It’s probably just as well, because I think I embarrassed myself. Boy was I tired that night!
Day 4: Today we saw 90 patients. Again, very interesting patients and I had a great time working with the RCN doctor and his staff. Additionally, I got to evaluate most of the monks that worked at the temple we were using. At the end of the day, we gave away our excess medications to the local physicians. They took everything – even my bug spray (the mosquitoes ate me alive that night!). Plus they wanted a stethoscope and some of my textbooks. How could I say no?
Day 5: Today, the King of Cambodia came to visit the USS GARY! My medical team wanted to do a tour of the GARY. However, since USS GARY is based in Yokosuka and I see it all the time, I wasn’t so interested in the tour. Instead, I was able to get a ride up to Phnom Penh where I spent the day touring on my own. I went to the Russian Market where I bought lots of little things (cloth, jewelry, pottery, paintings) for Rebecca (and learned that I am very bad at haggling). Then I went to see the Royal Palace, which is actually not so much a palace as a group of large exquisitely decorated temples and shrines over several acres. They had lots of gold and were quite ornate! Unfortunately, you can’t take pictures inside the temples (or wear shoes), so you’ll have to imagine what that looked like. My colleagues then met me and we all went to Tuolsleng, a former elementary school turned concentration camp by the Khmer Rouge. It is now a genocide museum, dedicated to the 30,000 Cambodians that died there; it has been renovated little since it was used by the Khmer Rouge. You may remember this tragedy from the movie “The Killing Fields.” It was a very sobering experience. That night, I caught a plane and headed back to Japan.

Two days later, I was on a ship headed back out to sea. My experiences underway weren’t too much different than the last time I went to sea, so if you want to know what happened you can just read my last ship blog and change the name of the ship. The only different thing I did this time was that I got to take a helicopter one day so that I wasn’t stuck on the same ship for the whole 2 weeks. Here is a picture of what it looks like looking out of a helicopter getting ready to land on a little square going up and down in the middle of the ocean. It is very herky-jerky – and for some (not me of course), a little scary! Anyway, that’s more than enough for now. Good night! - Josh