A mother in labour with life-threatening antepartum hemorrhage survived a eleventh hour emergency medical evacuation from Losuia village on Kiriwina Island, to Alotau Hospital in Milne Bay Province, on Saturday, Jule 22nd.
In attempts to help the mother, Doctors at Alotau Provincial Health Authority contacted Manolos Aviation’s Jurgen Ruh.
Ruh was busy airlifting emergency relief supplies for the areas affected by Mt Bagana volcanic eruption in South Bougainville, in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville.
On Friday at 1:10pm, the contact stated: “Tried dinghy trip but could not get out. (Sea) too rough.”
Due to bad weather, poor network communication at Losuia and the availability of serviceable aircrafts outside Milne Bay Province, the only option was to launch the medevac from Tokua in East New Britain the next day.
Ruh and his emergency medevac nurse Sr Naomi Pamaraka left Buka on Friday afternoon and arrived at the Manolos Ulaveo base in East New Britain. On Saturday around 7am, the medevac team were already refueling at Tokua Airport. Despite the shortage of fuel, Puma Energy did supplied enough fuel for the Tokua to Kiriwina to Alotau medevac.
The medevac duo left Tokua at 8am and arrived at Losuia government station on Kiriwina Island at 11am. According to health workers on the ground, the mother was already having hypotension, and was not responding. The baby’s heart rate is fine, but the mother’s, is dropping at a constant rate.
“We almost lost her in-flight,” Ruh recalled. “The contractions and bleeding started again in-flight. We rushed her into Alotau Hospital unconscious, and they resuscitated her...my nurse kept her alive during flight. Without my nurse I would have lost her on the way.”
An update from the Alotau Hospital Emergency team the same day (Saturday July 22nd) stated:
“Losuai Obstetrics Emergency with mother bleeding during labour (Antepartum Hemorrhage) was medevac'd by Manolos Aviation. In flight mum fitted (had seizures) due to massive blood loss and not enough oxygen going to the brain, hence, unstable during flight. Arrived, 12:15pm in the labour ward unconscious and in shock from the blood loss, she had no wrist (radial) pulse and blood pressure cannot be detected and low oxygenated blood to brain. She also had abdominal pains and still bleeding. Her baby's heart beat was very low and fading. She was resuscitated with intravenous fluids and blood transfusions. The Obstetrics team at Alotau did an emergency cesarean section on the mother to deliver her baby at 2pm. She delivered a male baby who was born with less oxygen to the vital organs such as the brain, hence, baby was well resuscitated with oxygen and eventually baby turned pink with good heart beats and making noises. This mother was diagnosed with Placenta Previa type 2 which means that the placenta lying lower covering the opening of the birth canal (cervix). Since onset of labour the mum had lost a lot of blood and had a Hemoglobin count of 3.6g/dL. Post operatively, the mum was admitted to Intensive Care Unit (ICU) with tube in the airway and few blood transfusions to recover. She was properly managed by the Medical team at ICU with her baby admitted to Special Care Nursery.”
On Monday 24th of July, a few bags of blood were donated by Islands Petroleum staff at Alotau Hospital to be tested and used for the mother. The medevac team were so pleased with the outcome.
The mother and baby both have since recovered.
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