Bahraini students on African excursion

Manama : A team of future doctors and nurses from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland – Medical University of Ireland (RCSI Bahrain) gained valuable field experience in Lesotho in southern Africa earlier this year, as part of the annual International Community Engagement programme.

Bahraini students Mohamed Alreefi and Noora Althawadi (medicine) and Aysha Snan and Maryam Jasim (nursing) travelled to the mountainous enclave state – which is surrounded by South Africa – alongside RCSI Bahrain Senior Lecturer in Family Medicine, Dr David Misselbrook.

There they joined larger group of almost 100 builders, teachers, parents and secondary school student volunteers from Action Ireland Trust (AIT).

The RCSI Bahrain contingent worked principally in partnership with St Joseph’s Hospital in Roma, a small town some 35 kilometers from the capital, Maseru, where five doctors and a larger team of nurses aim to provide all inpatient and outpatient care to a rural population of around 200,000 people.

As part of their two-week visit, the team conducted an outreach primary care clinic at a remote school in Hlalele, where they saw approximately 150 patients, while the students also led an Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS) session at the Roma College of Nursing, using inflatable resuscitation dummies supplied by RCSI Bahrain.

In addition, the group attended a local home for disabled children, had dinner with the Archbishop of Lesotho and attended an Irish-Lesotho-Bahraini cultural event in the company of their Majesties the King and Queen of Lesotho, the Prime Minister and other cabinet members.

Speaking upon the group’s return to Bahrain, Dr Misselbrook described the trip as ‘an amazing and eye-opening experience’. “We realised how fortunate we are to learn and to practice in healthcare professions within a wealthy and well-developed nation such as Bahrain,” he added.

The Lesotho trip was one of four to take place as part of what was the biggest ICE programme to date in terms of the numbers of locations visited and students to take part.

Alongside Research and Teaching and Learning, Community Engagement is the third pillar of RCSI Bahrain’s strategic plan (2012- 2017) and, as such,, the Community Engagement office works tirelessly to extending opportunities to students and staff to engage in various activities to benefit both at an individual level and the community level in Bahrain and overseas.

Lesotho, officially the Kingdom of Lesotho, is an enclaved, landlocked country in southern Africa completely surrounded by South Africa. It is just over 30,000 km2 (11,583 sq mi) in size and has a population slightly over two million. Its capital and largest city is Maseru. Lesotho is a member of the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Nations and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). The name Lesotho translates roughly into the land of the people who speak Sesotho. About 40% of the population lives below the international poverty line of US $1.25 a day.