Student aids Irma victims

A week ago, hurricane Irma raged across the Caribbean. For Lenny Marapin (23) this was the start of a very busy weekend. As a resident at the Saint Elisabeth Hospital on Curacao, the Master’s student Medicine helped a large number of victims from the ravaged St. Maarten.
By Koen Marée / Translation by Alain Reniers

‘No one guessed beforehand that the destruction on St. Maarten would be this bad’, says Marapin, who from July this year will be working as a resident for 12-month period. ‘Patients with a medical emergency were flown by helicopter from St. Maarten to our hospital.’

This passenger flow resulted in quite the logistics problem at Saint Elisabeth Hospital where about ten other RUG students are currently doing their residency. Out of the five wards, two had to be cleared out for foreign patients who were brought in with a medical emergency.


Lenny Marapin would love to go to St. Maarten to help out. ‘They can use all the help they can get.’

Marapin wanted to help out. When he was asked if he was prepared to work on Saturday, his day off, he never doubted for a second. ‘I’m from Aruba originally, where I lived until I was eighteen years old. I had no difficulty imagining what such a situation would be like. Now it’s us who are taking care of the patients, but what would it have been like if the storm raged over our island or Aruba?’

Most patients are not direct victims of hurricane Irma. Bar a few, the hospital primarily took over primary standard care after the facilities on St. Maarten could no longer be used. ‘This includes kidney dialysis, gall bladders, broken fingers. People cannot be treated on St. Maarten anymore’, Marapin explains. ‘I did have a patient, for example, who caught something in his eye during the storm.’

Royalty

Last Saturday, the hospital welcomed the Dutch royalty. ‘Willem-Alexander came by to lend his support, which was nice; quite the experience.’ At the hospital, the King spoke with victims, something Marapin has not gotten around to. ‘It really was too busy. My conversations purely concerned the patients’ needs, the medication they required. Maybe I’ll get round to it tomorrow.’

In the coming period, things will remain busy at the hospital, but less and less people are coming from St. Maarten. ‘A small portion of the patients have already returned to the island’, Marapin says. ‘I think we did a good job in how we helped the patients. Now I simply hope things will turn out well for St. Maarten. Right now, I have to stay here for my internship, but I would love to go there to help out. They can use all the help they can get.’

Dutch

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