Nursing As A Team Sport

     My daughter Claire is currently in Kurdistan with the international medical organization MedGlobal (See post from 4/4/2019, "On Her Way To Kurdistan") ,

​...whose doctors and nurses have recently arrived in that autonomous region of Iraq to help care for the Syrian, Iraqi, and Yazidi refugees who have sought asylum there after fleeing war and violence in their own countries.

     Claire has been communicating with the family via Facebook, sending us brief updates and pictures almost daily, and she and I were able to have a chat this past Monday despite the 7-hour time difference.

      Claire left Chicago one week ago today and by the following evening she had arrived in Erbil, the capital of Kurdistan, where she was met by members of the MedGlobal team.      
      While waiting for a flight carrying another MedGlobal volunteer she and her escorts had a look around Erbil, stopping at a beautiful  market,

...and climbing a hill to the Erbil Citadel, which offered a panoramic view of the city.

      From Erbil the MedGlobal escorts drove the new volunteers to their destination, the city of Dohuk, outside of which the refugee camps are located.    
     The following day, Saturday, the MedGlobal team was invited to a meeting with the Kurdish Ministers of Health (Claire is seated at the far left end of the table and is wearing the pink-striped jacket),

​...and there was a press conference to let the people of Dohuk know that the MedGlobal volunteers had arrived to work in the camps.

     Claire told me that she's appeared on Kurdistani television twice so far.

    Later in the day there was time for an exploratory stroll around Dohuk,

...including a beautiful market called The Bazaar, where one can find lots of fresh vegetables, mountains of dried fruits and nuts,

​...and sweets.

   In fact, said Claire, there are so many lovingly displayed desserts in the shops of this town,

...that she declared Dohuk a Liszkay family's dream come true, referring to our hallmark love of sweets and desserts.
      When I asked Claire if she felt safe in the city she assured me that Dohuk is a very safe place, likely in no small part due to the armed soldiers and check points stationed all over the town.
     The following day, Sunday, the MedGlobal team headed out to the refugee camps.
       The Dohuk camps have been in existence for several years; at the camp Claire  visited the refugees had shipping container houses and houses made of concrete blocks covered with tarps which, Claire said, are much better than tents.
     The medical clinics are already staffed with Kurdish health care providers, and the MedGlobal group and their Kurdish hosts came to the consensus that, along with helping with patient care, it would also be beneficial to determine what MedGlobal could do for the health care providers who are already working at the camps.
     It turns out that what the Kurdish medical staff needs most to better carry out their healing mission are more supplies, more money, and more training.
      To that end, Claire, who has Intensive Care experience, offered to use her time there to train nurses.
       "I like to support nurses," she explained.
      Subsequently it was decided that she could be of the most use not in the refugee camps but in the city hospital. So she was sent back to the hospital in town to give the nurses some training, teaching different lessons every day, such as this lesson on resuscitation with the ICU nurses.

    Claire's first and continuing lesson to her students, however, has been on her personal motto: "Nursing is a team sport."
      And, having been captain of the field hockey team, in high school,   

​...the lacrosse team,

...and the swim team,

...Claire knows about team sports.