Medic returns from Afghanistan

Thursday August 12, 2010

After more than three months serving in war-ravaged Afghanistan, a Hammersmith Hospital nurse has returned to London and spoken of her harrowing ordeal.

Caroline Frederick, who has worked at the Shepherds Bush-based hospital since 1995, came back in January following her time in the critical recovery unit of a combined forces field hospital in Camp Bastion.

She spoke to h&f news about the daily challenges she faced on the front line in Afghanistan and the disturbing images left behind in her memory.

“I started receiving patients at 8am each day and they would keep arriving until about 8pm,” she said. “When one man stepped on a mine, you might have five or six men injured.

“We also had civilians coming in, children and Afghan soldiers, and sometimes even the enemy would come in and we would treat them.”

Caroline is a member of the Territorial Army’s B Squadron, based in Kensington High Street, and the stint in Afghanistan was her second tour, following a deployment to Iraq four years ago.

She said the scenes she witnessed in the military hospital – and particularly the gruesome injuries sustained in bomb blasts – never grew any easier to bear.

“While I was waiting for patients in recovery I would also have to pick up lots of body parts. “I can still visualise the body parts and some of them, like a child’s finger, were very upsetting,” she said.

“I was also witnessing people dying on the operating table. Every time that happened I had to find a quiet corner and cry.

“I would also talk a lot with soldiers who had lost their limbs. I was treating their wounds, but I was also treating their hearts and minds.

“Some of them were asking about guys who were dead.

“Clinically, I was well prepared but psychologically and emotionally I wasn’t.

“That’s why it was hard, and it happened on a day-today basis. But you just have to have your own coping mechanism.”

Caroline was often left to her own devices in the recovery ward and said the frenetic pace of work brought its own share of challenges.

“The most I could accept was three patients at once and so I had to discharge them quickly so I could receive the next patients,” she said.

“It was quite difficult and sometimes the surgeons would need to close up quickly because new critical patients had arrived.

“And while they were there, the condition of some would worsen so I had to make the right decision with the experience I had.”

But as gruelling as the job was, Caroline firmly believes she has become a better nurse through the experience.

“From a clinical perspective I got experience of dealing with mass casualties, but I also improved my relationships with the staff and soldiers. I am relating better to them now,” she said.

“It was very, very rewarding and I just really wanted to do the best I could for the team.”