Down time

Everyone on the team definitely works hard and puts plenty of hours in at the hospital on these trips. Every now and then people do get some much deserved (and needed) time off.

Yesterday I accompanied ICU nurses Liz Lombardi (who you may have already met in her feature article) and Kiasha McInnis as well as ward nurse Genna Gava. Kiasha works as the nurse educator for the paediatric ICU at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead in NSW and Genna is a cardiac ward nurse from Flinders Medical in Adelaide.

The morning trip involved heading to a local botanic garden and park as well as visiting the Bomana War Cemetery. Bomana war cemetery is the resting place of 3,824 Commonwealth troops which includes soldiers from PNG and Australia. We were escorted by our driver Ricky and his colleagues from the hospital who explained the contents of the events affecting the local people and local culture.

Today and tomorrow a few people will be heading to Loloata Island for some snorkelling and some downtime on the beach. So after a few hours of rest it’s back to the hospital once again for more work and more lifesaving medical procedures.