‘If we think we’ve got a health care crisis, let me take you to Ethiopia’ – Dr. Matt Campbell

Dr. Matt Campbell was ready to call it a night after a long first day in an Ethiopia hospital when a messenger said he was needed in the operating room.

A woman who had walked 15 days from a distant village just to arrive at Soddo Christian Hospital on her due date was in labor. After eight stillbirths, she needed a cesarean section to deliver her ninth baby if the child had any hope of survival.

But Campbell, 32, a general surgeon with Holy Family Memorial, hadn’t done a c-section in years. He and Dr. John Foor, a longtime friend and fellow missionary, grabbed a copy of Williams’ Obstetrics, crammed in the surgeons’ lounge and hoped for the best.

Then came the power outage.

The two operated by flashlight as they waited for a generator to kick in. Moments later, a baby boy emerged — happy, healthy and, best of all, breathing.

The Jan. 12 delivery was the first of 55 operations for Campbell of Manitowoc and Foor of Columbus, Ohio, during a two-week missionary trip to work at the hospital in Soddo, Ethiopia. The two cared for nearly 45 inpatients and 15 outpatients each day as they covered for two general surgeons, an orthopedic surgeon, a gynecologist and five surgical residents. Their stay was arranged through World Medical Mission, also known as Samaritan’s Purse.

“They knew that hospital was going to be without,” Campbell said, explaining the various reasons the medical professionals were away from Soddo at the time. “If you’re not there, there is no one else to treat their illnesses. Anything that could possibly need surgery, we were there for.”

Campbell and Foor trained together back in Ohio, Campbell’s home state, and opted for careers in medicine as a result of the same mentor-missionary, Dr. Pedro Obregon, also of Columbus.

“It’s doing trips like this that got me into medicine in the first place,” Campbell said. “It really lets you practice medicine as it was intended — to treat sick people.”

What most American medical professionals probably don’t expect to treat, however, are wild animal attacks — even “minor” ones. Campbell naturally was taken aback when a patient — with some severe scratches to his arm — arrived one day to have an eye tumor operated on.

“He wasn’t going to mention it,” Campbell recalled. “But we asked what happened to his arm and he said, ‘Oh yeah, that’s from the lion.’ He had actually been mauled by a lion on his way to the hospital.”

More surprising for Campbell, however, was the scope of the operations he was called to do while in Ethiopia. Like in the United States, patients arrive with bad cancers and require large operations — even with less equipment.

“You just have to do everything the old-fashioned way,” he said. “And everyone else just throws all their support behind you.”

He also got a quick lesson in true “general” surgery, as he was expected to perform all essential procedures, even those he typically wouldn’t do at Holy Family Memorial. In Ethiopia, Campbell removed a 5-pound kidney tumor from a 4-year-old boy. Here, he said he would have “very quickly” referred the child to a pediatric cancer specialist.

Campbell said the experience taught him to complain less, appreciate the luxuries of working in a well-stocked hospital, be thankful for the simple things — like nurses who speak English — and be more patient overall.

“If we think we’ve got a health care crisis, let me take you to Ethiopia,” he said.

Tack those lessons onto the countless others he’s taken from past missionary trips to Myanmar, Thailand, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Mongolia, Rwanda and the Philippines, and you’ll understand his drive to serve. His goal is to continue working one or two missionary trips every year.

“My passion is to get back in Myanmar and have a recurring presence there,” he said, acknowledging the current challenges of getting into the country. “In the meantime, I may go back to Ethiopia on a regular basis.”

The downside of Campbell’s trips is time away from his wife, Wendy, and daughters, Emma, 4, and Tessa, 2. The family moved to Manitowoc last summer, and Campbell started his post at Holy Family Memorial in July.

“Holy Family’s mission of community service was consistent with what I wanted to do,” Campbell said. “I’m loving the job here, too. I’m taking care of my neighbors every day.”

To learn more about Soddo Christian Hospital, visit www.soddo.org. For more about Holy Family Memorial, visit www.hfmhealth.org.

By Helen Clarke | Herald Times