Page 12 - QARANC Vol 14 No 8 2014

10 QARANC THE GAZETTE
Life in ‘Retirement’!
Colonel Sheenah Davies RRC DStJ DL
During a recent visit to Guernsey I had the pleasure of meeting up with Colonel Sheenah Davies RRC DStJ DL who served in the QARANC for some 27 years. She was on the Island to give a talk on the St John Eye Hospital in Jerusalem with which she has a close association with as the Hospitaller of the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem – a position she has held since 2008.
During her Service career Colonel Davies was awarded the Royal Red Cross (RRC) in the 1996 New Year’s Honours List before retiring from the Army later that year. She and her husband Grant settled in County Durham where for 15 years she was closely associated with St John Ambulance first as Commander and later as Chairman of Council. She was admitted to the Order of St John as an Officer (Sister) in 1997, promoted to Commander (Sister) in 2004 and, in May 2011, she was promoted to Dame of the Order (DStJ). Her commitment to the community was recognised in 2000 when she was commissioned by the Lord Lieutenant of the County of Durham as a Deputy Lieutenant (DL).
The St John Eye Hospital in Jerusalem has been providing nursing care to the Palestinian people for 128 years. As a charity, the teaching and training nurses is one of the hospital’s primary objectives and its Sir Stephen Miller School of Nursing has been educating local nurses for more than 40 years. The Specialist Ophthalmic Nursing Course makes unique postgraduate training available in the region, and is accredited by the Thames Valley University.
Married with four stepchildren and eleven grandchildren, Colonel Sheenah resides in Teesdale. During our meeting she was very keen to learn about the Corps and once her term as Hospitaller ends she hopes to have more time to support the QARANC Association.
Colonel Sue Bush Colonel Commandant
One man’s trash is another’s treasure
Are you one of those people who have wondered what it would be like to take on charity work abroad?
The first thing to consider is whether you can afford the cost of the trip. Charity can begin at home with local charities that can be fractionally less to support.
Holistically, volunteering ought to benefit the organisation you are going to invest your time and money in rather than for personal benefit. Wanderlust for places that appeals most to the senses should be discouraged. But equally, the organisation’s motives will dictate their philosophy, which you’ll have to endure and may conflict with your own.
In this case, the deciding factor was largely personal wherefore the faces reflective of poor healthcare resonated in my philanthropic memory while growing up. For me these people are the Guatemalans. Noted for its flamboyant colours and Mayan civilisation, Guatemala is located centrally along the spine of Central America.
It has a gentrifying persona, which varies from the rich, foreboding mini- cooper and BMW dealerships to the poverty of the trash miners a mile further away. The city dump is approximately 40 acres in size, or the visual equivalent of 25 football fields able to hold 3750 cars. Anyone inhabiting the dump could present with scabies, diarrhoea, vomiting, worms, dermatological problems and infection with the added danger from toxins leaking into the surrounding area when there are floods. Amid this coagulating waste, the scavengers as they are known, forage for food and re-usable junk to resell. Scavengers are second or third generation foragers whose lives revolve around the city’s dump.
Over the five day period a team of 30 medical volunteers flown in from around the world was mobilised to the main effort which was pre-selected by the organisers. The medical facility was a congregation hall, skeletal but spacious, it facilitated our mobile
capability assets, triage, labs, dental, Dr’s assessment room, counselling and pharmacy. Three persons were allocated to a team and I was placed in labs, tasked with pregnancy/ HIV testing/ urinalysis/ minor suturing and not forgetting eye testing!
The news had already circulated to the community via the local church and we arrived every day to find queues already formed at 0700. We’re informed that some people would not come because it would be a day away from the dump and away from making money.
Each person was received with an attempted mutter of a Spanish greeting which transpired roughly into a Guatemalan greeting that they laughed at, then their basic observation were taken. They are then circulated through the chain of departments via the interpreters. As they make their way to labs, dishevelled children, with olive complexions and remnants of dirt from the dump play under the quiet supervision of their mothers. There are no great time pressures, no bed manager quibbling or phones blaring. Their mothers are there to have a pregnancy test done. The interpreters repeat the same message as before on the collection and disposal of the sample.
Some are elated to be told they’re expecting a child while they concurrently manage the reins on their two and three year old, while some younger girls look disappointed that they’re not expecting their first. This reminds us that education and support is needed beyond our departure. Over the course of the five days, we see 2341 patients, with a mixed demographic of adults and children. I leave not understanding the impact of what has transpired, it was to me the same as my regular job, but if anyone views it differently then I trust you will be motivated to give this venture a go. Sgt Turnbull
MDHU Frimley Park