RIFLE — Two Grand River Well being docs and their households went to Ukraine lower than two months after Russia invaded. They introduced with them medical provides, $4,000 price of prescription drugs and a great deal of essential data.
Docs Michael Duehrssen and Heath Cotter taught younger Ukrainian combatants easy methods to subject costume wounds. They handled sick refugees. One in all their daughters performed harp for war-stressed orphans.
Throughout this humanitarian mission, the 2 Rifle docs labored side-by-side with two Ukrainian docs: husband and spouse Serhii and Yuliia Serdeniuk.
Shortly after 6 p.m. Japanese European Time on Thursday, Dr. Serhii battled intermittent blackouts as he spoke with the Publish Impartial over WhatsApp, a free, worldwide communication service.
A distorted man’s voice muffled over an intercom at Angelia Clinic, a personal observe located amongst a fleet of tall, block flats about two miles east of the Dnipro River in Kyiv, whereas Dr. Serhii rationalized why he’s going to quickly go away Ukraine for, of all locations, Rifle, Colorado.
“I wish to meet as (many) folks as doable to ask you to help our service,” he mentioned, calmly, in his greatest English. “Simply yesterday our medical tools for dentistry broke and we want $10,000 to exchange that.”
Grand River Well being Group Relations Director Annick Pruett mentioned Dr. Serhii, who labored so intently with Cotter and Duehrssen, is slated to look at Grand River Well being’s Colorado River Room from 5:30-7 p.m. Wednesday. Grand River Well being is positioned at 501 Airport Street.
“He will probably be giving an replace on the state of affairs there in addition to an replace on the brand new clinic they’ve constructed,” she mentioned.
Serhii is director of a cellular clinic unit. These rolling medical bastions go to and serve the conflict’s entrance traces, proper now predominantly on the jap edges of the nation. He has to date carried out about 60-65 clinics, each serving about 30 folks day by day.
Provides are all the time dwindling, he mentioned. As a result of Russia has modified its techniques from a failed blitzkrieg strategy to a brutal conflict of attrition, hospitals, faculties — even locations the place they make prescription drugs — proceed to be focused by long-range missiles.
“Due to conflict, Russians bombed two of the largest factories who produced treatment for Ukraine,” Dr. Serhii mentioned. “Proper now, even when we’ve got cash, we are able to’t purchase it in Ukraine, as a result of it’s not being produced for Ukraine.”
Dr. Serhii grew extra animated as he continued to listing off additional medical wants. This contains something and the whole lot, from $20,000 for a brand new ultrasound machine and a more recent battery, to psychological drugs as a result of anxiousness amongst Ukrainians is now widespread. As blackouts proceed, Dr. Serhii works with a flashlight, generally even simply candlelight.
Simply this week, Dr. Serhii would take a automobile experience throughout Ukraine to Warsaw, Poland. From there, a flight to Munich, Germany. Then a flight from Munich to Frankfurt, Germany. From Frankfurt, Denver Worldwide Airport. From DIA, the ascent alongside Interstate 70 to Rifle.
Dr. Serhii then turned apprehensive. He doesn’t wish to go away for Colorado, he mentioned. He would quite keep and assist as many individuals as he can. At this second he additionally remembered the assistance he obtained from overseas docs, together with Cotter and Duehrssen.
“These actually courageous guys, they introduced large packing containers stuffed with medical provides,” he mentioned.
Docs Cotter and Duehrssen as soon as joined Dr. Serhii on a go to to a Ukrainian village close to the Romanian border. A contingent of refugees had just lately arrived from the war-torn metropolis of Mariupol, one of the vital closely devastated cities of all the conflict to date.
Dr. Serhii mentioned one of many refugees, a 13-year-old boy, had been bleeding closely from his nostril for half an hour straight. With Dr. Cotter’s help, the bleeding stopped in three minutes, and the boy of about 110 kilos survived.
“Dr. Heath personally stopped the bleeding,” Dr. Serhii mentioned. “That was a miracle that he’d been there simply in that second, when he was wanted principally.
“Once we stopped the bleeding, (the boy) began to vomit blood. We collected half a liter of blood he swallowed earlier than.”
The previous 11 months have clearly been something however regular for Dr. Serhii, whose first style of conflict got here when he was referred to as up as a navy physician in 2015. When Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, Dr. Serhii moved his household from Kyiv to Germany, and so they have since come again.
He has meals, a roof over his head and heat, he mentioned. All the things in Kyiv is “not so dangerous,” he joked facetiously. However he’s additionally misplaced a lot, together with pals.
“I misplaced,” he mentioned poignantly. He then sighed. “My buddy, he was a colonel within the Ukrainian Military… Yeah, I misplaced lots of people.”
Dec. 21, 2022 marked a historic day in United States’ historical past. It was the primary time, since British Prime Minister Winston Churchill did it in 1941, {that a} overseas nationwide chief got here to Washington to deal with Congress. In his speech, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy mentioned that, regardless of continued help from the U.S., there nonetheless must be extra.
“Your help is essential, not simply to face in such a struggle, however to get to the turning level to win on the battlefield,” he instructed Congress. “Now we have artillery, sure. Now we have it. Is it sufficient? Fairly actually, not likely.”
On a a lot scaled down model, Dr. Serhii’s go to to Rifle is chock stuffed with the identical intentions.
“I’ve only one week to satisfy as many individuals as doable,” he reiterated. “As a result of I’ll be again Tuesday to Ukraine, and Wednesday we’ll go to Mykolaiv. It’s a metropolis on the shore of the Black Sea, and so they bomb it each day. We promise the folks we will probably be there and serve them for 3 days.”
“I can’t miss this journey.”
This story is from PostIndependent.com.
