The Iraqis' Stories: Overwhelmed Iraqi doctors need training, supplies

More than half the civilians who die as a result of attacks in Iraq could have been saved if better medical equipment and more experienced staff were available, a team of doctors working there said on Friday.

In addition to doctors' daily struggle without the necessary equipment or training, they face regular attacks on their lives, Bassim Al Sheibani and his Iraqi colleagues wrote in the British Medical Journal.

"As the violence escalates and we attempt daily to deal with the devastating effect of multiple deaths and severe injury, the reality is that we cannot provide any treatment for many of the victims," they wrote.

Emergency medicine in Iraq is not sufficiently developed to cope with such overwhelming demand while doctors lack adequate emergency training, the article said. Many victims are killed outright in attacks, but far more are wounded.

Lack of expertise is made worse by lack of basic equipment, supplies and drugs.

"Many emergency departments are no more than halls with beds, fluid suckers and oxygen bottles. Radiography facilities, sonar machines and laboratory services are unattainable luxuries," the doctors wrote.

Ambulance drivers have no paramedical training, only a handful of hospitals have emergency departments and injured people are usually escorted by family members with no knowledge of using any medical equipment, the doctors said.

"If the person is lucky enough to arrive at a hospital alive, staff insert an intravenous cannula (tube) and send him or her on to one of the few specialised centres," the doctors wrote.

At the same time, many doctors fear for their lives -- perceived as members of an elite, they have become the target of daily insurgent activities.

"Last week a close colleague ... was killed as he left his clinic; three masked people stopped and fired six bullets into his head, chest and abdomen," the doctors wrote. "Who are these people and why did they kill him? We do not know."

Read the rest at Reuters/Alternet