AID WORKER PROFILESName: Gerry Bashein
Role: Anesthesiologist
From: Seattle, Washington
Age: 68

Describe the different roles and responsibilities in your assignments? Did you work outside of your specialty?

Anesthesia for general surgery was a part of each assignment, but some missions included a significant proportion of obstetrics—in Liberia, Sudan, and Sri Lanka—or trauma—in Nigeria, and Indonesia. In Indonesia, I was also in charge of the intensive care unit for both medical and surgical patients. In Sri Lanka, I provided relief coverage for the emergency room doctor.

What did you find most challenging about your work?

I had to deal with illnesses that I don’t normally handle as an anesthesiologist in the U.S. The lack of lab facilities, x-ray, and specialists to discuss medical issues with presented different challenges. Without a lab to do bacterial cultures and other tests and measurements, we gave antibiotics, fluids, electrolytes, etc. empirically. Blood was always in short supply. There was limited or no banked blood. I lost a patient who had a pelvic fracture because we couldn’t get blood in time.

Read the rest of Dr. Gerry Bashein’s interview.

photo: 2012 © MSF