Making it happen – Doctor drops hospital salary to serve African mission

He spent the first two weeks chatting with the local doctors and nurses. “I was a newcomer. If I started work as soon as I arrived there, they would not have listened to my advice at all,” he says.

For many doctors who would like to join the MSF, language is a barrier. Communication at the missions is typically conducted in English or French.

It is also the reason so few mainland doctors attend the missions. Tu Zheng was the first and only doctor from the mainland admitted to MSF. The gynecologist’s first mission was to Liberia in 2007, and she joined a second mission to Turkmenistan from February to September last year.

“In our curriculum, English is something we only briefly gloss over. The students who have some command of English usually lack professional knowledge about medicine. Because all MSF interviews are conducted in English, few mainland doctors can ever be posted,” says Helen Zhao, liaison manager of MSF Guangzhou.

Liu agrees that language is an obstacle.

Before being sent to a mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liu studied 30 hours of French. “I only knew basic greetings and the vocabulary related to anesthesia,” he says.

As a doctor, his mission was to heal the wounded and rescue the dying. But as part of MSF, his job is to provide relief to the victims of disasters both natural and man-made.

When he arrived in Congo, he was called on to treat many victims of gunshot wound: both soldiers and civilians who had been shot in the war.

“When you see war, you realize how stupid it really is. You may think you are tough when you are swinging around a weapon, but once you get hit by a bullet you end up like a lame dog,” Liu says, gesturing to an X-ray picture of a soldier’s broken arm. Doctors were forced to amputate the arm to stop an advancing infection.

Liu often lamented his inability to save many patients.

One 13-year-old girl he treated had developed typhoid fever and the bacteria tore through her intestines. The food went directly from her month to her anus, and she soon died of malnutrition.

“It is always tortuous to decide whether to proceed with a surgery or give up – especially when the decision can bring a patient’s life to an early termination,” he says.