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Edmonton medical volunteers provide 'life-changing' surgeries in Ecuador

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'It reminds me of why I went into medicine in the first place'

Dr. Ryan Wright of Edmonton carried this 87-year-old patient down a stairwell when a power outage disabled the hospital elevator. (Darrel Comeau/CAMTA)

When the power went out at Hospital Padre Carollo in Quito, Ecuador on Tuesday, a medical team prepping a patient for hip surgery didn't even consider cancelling the procedure.

With the elevators out of service, team members found a way to bring the 87-year-old woman down the narrow stairwell from the third to first floor, where the operating room and other essential services remained functional with the help of a generator.

"There really was only enough room to comfortably kind of put her on my back," said Dr. Ryan Wright, a family physician from Edmonton who specializes in orthopedics.

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Wright piggy-backed the patient to the OR where she underwent hip replacement surgery.

"She's doing very well after surgery, " Wright said Thursday. "She just walked the length of the hospital hallway and down a flight of stairs. We're hoping she'll go home as soon as today."

Show more During a power outage in a hospital in Quito, Ecuador, an Edmonton doctor carried a female patient down two flights of stairs to the OR. 0:12

Wright is on a team of doctors, surgeons, nurses, physiotherapists and others who are part of the annual Canadian Association of Medical Teams Abroad (CAMTA) mission to Quito, Ecuador's capital.

The Edmonton-based organization was co-founded in 2001 by Dr. Marc Moreau, a pediatric orthopedic surgeon, and his wife Barb Moreau, a former nurse who now organizes the mission trips.

Moving the patient down two flights of stairs during a power failure is a great example of the teamwork among the volunteers, Barb Moreau said.

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"Somebody carrying her IV [intravenous] line, carrying her, somebody covering her because she's in a hospital gown straddled on Ryan's shoulders," she said. "Everything here is an incredible team effort."

The majority of the 96 volunteers on CAMTA's 18th mission are from Edmonton, with others from across Alberta, B.C., Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Nova Scotia.

Over two weeks, about 35 adults will undergo hip replacement surgeries and about 25 children will undergo surgery to repair a club foot, or improve movement strained by cerebral palsy.

Alfredo, 4, has a rare birth defect of the foot. He underwent surgery as part of the CAMTA mission on Monday. (Darrel Comeau/CAMTA)

The surgery "truly is life-changing to these people," Barb Moreau said.

Many of the volunteers wrote on their applications that they wanted to join CAMTA because they want "to help or give back," she said.

"As they're saying that and I'm working through their application I know in the back of my head I want to say, 'You are going to go home with so much more than what you're going to give.'"

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This trip is Wright's sixth mission with CAMTA.

"Practising medicine can be quite stressful mentally and emotionally and when I come down here I just feel very recharged and it reminds me of why I went into medicine in the first place," Wright said.

Some Ecuadorians don't have access to the basic treatments taken for granted in Canada, he said. He described the case of a 30-year-old man who had fractures in both hips because of a bone disease.

Following surgery, the man was up and walking for the first time in four years, which had "everyone in tears," Wright said.

Dustin Rendon (left) is pictured with Barb Moreau, Dr. Marc Moreau and his twin brother Damon. (Darrel Comeau/CAMTA)

Some of the people who have been helped by the mission clinic in Hospital Padre Carollo return as volunteers.

Dustin Rendon came to CAMTA with a club foot 17 years ago. During the current mission, he and and his twin brother Damon volunteered as translators for the team.

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While the time spent in Ecuador is short and the interactions with patients happen over a few days, "You feel like you've made a friend on the other side of the world," Barb Moreau said.

Since few of the volunteers speak Spanish, most of the interaction involves "smiles and laughter and hugs," she said.

"It's pretty overwhelming every day here."