Burundi 2015: 21 February – 8 March

The first mission of the year in the Hospital of Bubanza in Burundi, in which Dr. Pietro Ortensi, Nurses Catia Di Natale and Fabio Masala, and myself took part on a voluntary basis, was characterised by a special event. In fact, during this mission, we implanted the first reverse shoulder prosthesis of Burundi and, probably, of the whole Central Africa. The operation was performed on a very young patient (32 years old) whose head of humerus was removed last year due to a burst fracture and a massive rotator cuff lesion. Since this situation had resulted in an almost complete functional impotence of the limb, which prevented any kind of work and severely limited the autonomy of the patient, we decided to implant the prosthesis. We had to face several organizational problems. The first, and most important, was to find a company that would make available to us, free of charge, the prosthesis and the instrumentation necessary for the implant. The problem was easily solved, as the company LIMA, a leading Italian company in the sector and to which we extend our thanks and gratitude, gave us the components to be implanted and provided us with all the necessary material for the operation. The other aspect that worried us a lot was the need to guarantee a complete asepsis of the environment and to reduce the sources of pollutionas much as possible. The intervention was perfectly successful and the patient is successfully practicing the necessary rehabilitation cycles to allow him to recover the functionality of the limb and to start working again as soon as possible. Overall, we have carried out about one hundred outpatient services divided between the centre for the handicapped in Kiganda, in the town of the same name located about 2,000 metres above sea level in the province of Muramviya, the Missionary Sistersof Charity (Sisters of Calcutta) and the health centre in Mirango, Bujumbura, as well as the hospital in Bubanza, our reference centre in Burundi. In Bubanza we performed a total of 39 surgeries, including fractures (4), club foot (6), osteomyelitis (3), knee deformities (8), chronic dislocations (3), amputation (1) and other minor surgeries. As always, we availed ourselves of the invaluable collaboration of local health personnel (mainly nurses and anaesthesia technicians). As in all missions, the Foundation paid all the medical expenses of the indigent people who were treated by us.

 Posted on March 28, 2015

Piero Petricca