BRAVE NURSES

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 141, 11 December 1925, Page 9

BRAVE NURSES

LIFE ON A LEPER ISLE

A VOLUNTARY EXILE

SUPREME SELF-SACBIFICE,

There arrived in Wellington yesterday afternoon from Napier .two Sisters of the Society of Mary. They are members, of the nursing staff of the leper hospital on the island of Makogai, Fiji, to which the leper patients from New Zealand, Samoa, Cook Islands, Fiji, and other adjacent South Sea islands are now sent. Both Sisters have come to this country, on medical advice, for a change and rest. One of them has been on. Makogai Island for thirteen years, and during that period has never left her post. While in Wellington they will be the guests of the Sisters of Mercy, Hill street. A description of the work carried out at tho leper station by the medical staff, tho eight French nuns, and their native assistants, is not without -niuch melancholy interest. Here,, cut off from tho outer world, live some'4oo lepers,, consisting of Fijians, Polynesians, Europeans, Chinese, and Indians. Periodically food and other supplies arc brought by steamer from Fiji to the lonely island with its community of death-in-life souls smitten with the most horrible malady on earth.

Makogai is an island lying some eighteen miles north-east of Levuka, the old capital of Fiji, and has an area of about 2000 acres. It is about 2J miles long and 1} miles broad, and is surrounded by coral reefs.

The island is a rooky cone with four distinct and many smaller peaks, the highest being 876 ft above sea leveL These run steeply down to the sea in rocky ridges, and at the foot and between these ridges the only flat land on the island is found. This area is nominally 358 acres, all certainly capable of growing coconuts, but not more than 100 acres are fit for growing, general crops, and the plough could not be used on more than 60 acres of soil good enough to repay cultivation. Prom tho highest peak on a bright, sunny day the view is truly glorious. You look down on a serifcs of sancty bays, fringed with palms; the sea near the shore, every shade of blue and green; the white surf beyond where the waves break on the reef; and then the deeper shade of the ocean studded with islands as. far as tho eye can reach. On the flats there is a fringe near the sea where the soil is too sandy to be of much use, and besides this a belt of scrub must be left to guard the crops from the .heavy trade winds that prevail. In Fiji the lepers are collected at vafious convenient depots, and then forwarded together to Makogai in the Government steamer." On arrival at Makogai, the lepers aiid their goods are landed in a large flat-bottomed punt worked by Fijian and Polynesian lepers. . ' ' TOTTB. HUNDRED LEPERS. Lepers were first, sent to Makogai in 1911 when 40 were transferred from Beqa. Sineo then the collection has gone oil steadily though slowly, and there are at present about 400 inmates at the" station. There are five leper villages, also hospital accommodation for women and the helpless and those acutely ill. The sexes are kept separate. Each nationality has its own village, and the medical superintendent appoints a leper headman to each. He is paid a small sum by the' Government,' and is responsible for the cleanliness of his village and good behaviour of the inmates. All lepers capable of it, are expected to perform certain work. They must keep their homes clean, do their share of the sanitary work of the village, and do a few hours every week weeding round the hospital and the paths from the villages to the hospital. All lepers who desire it are given the use of land and implements to cultivate it with. They are provided with poultry, and thero are large flocks of fowls and ducks. NURSING THE AFFLICTED. The staff of the asylum consists of: A medical superintendent, an assistant medical superintendent; eight European sisters, five native sisters, and. several other assistants. The hospital consists of a number of ddtached buildings constructed jf wood and galvanised iron, and made fly-proof with perforated zinc. . Eight European sisters of the Society of Mary and five native sisters are in charge of the hospital. They, witfc the assistance of two Fijian leper dressers, do all the dressings. The sisters also do the dispensing, housekeeping, and nursing. They alao visit the leper villages and do the dressings of those who cannot attend the hospital. A sister assists in the laboratory, and when there is only one doctor a sister gives the anaesthetics. Besides these duties, they find time to teach the children to read and write and the women to sew. The Wesleyan children are taught by the native minister. The Boman Catholic Mission, which takes the greatest interest in the asylum, has a resident chaplain, maintained without expense to the Government. Tho Wesleyan minister is a native leper. Each denomination has its own churches built of native material. The Indians also build their own places of worship. The friends- of the lepers are allowed to visit them twice year-

The patient's mail is disinfected with formalin vapour, and is dispatched once a month.

MEDICAL TREATMENT.

For the alleviation of the disease, experience shows that the chief factors are: Nutrition, fresh air, regulated exercise,, amusement, and chauljnoogra oil. The leper's mind must be lifted by amusement and employment from the state of fatuity it is so liable to lapse into, and last but not least, chaulmoogra oil has a marked and beneficial effect on nearly all stages of leprosy. It is given at the asylum by the mouth daily in emulsion with ttino water, and intra: muscularly weekly in the form of a mixture of chaulmoogra, resorcin, and camphor. The surgical treatment is. also of the greatest importance—the free removal of diseased bone and amputation of hopelessly septic limbs £b of the gx^VtMt MaiiU&ee im fkUari-

ating pain and improving the condition of the patient.

TRAINING AND REST-HOME REQUIRED.

Although the Fijian Government has made provision for the accommodation of the medical and nursing staff, at the hospital, it is necessary in order to keep up a succession of nurses that an efficient training home and rest-home should be provided for them. Until recently the cost of training fresh nurses has been borno by sympathisers in France. Owing, Jiowover, to post-war conditions, and to the many calls in other parts of the world, such financial support ia not now forthcoming. Hence it is necessary to look to New Zealand for some assistance in building a training home for nurses to take the place of members of the present staff when they take ill. Last year Auckland citizens spontaneously subscribed about £400 to further the work of these devoted women amongst the lepers, but funds are still needed to enable a training home to be built on the island, and a recuperating home for tho nursing staff. In view of the fact that some lepers have been sent from New Zealand to the leper station, and that leper patients have been sent, and will continue to be sent, from Samoa and the Cook Islands, it would seem that there is a claim upon the people of this country to assist in the carrying on of the splendid work being done by the devoted band of nurses who are ministering to those whoso life is one of complete gloom. Any contributions towards this object will be received and acknowledged by the Marist Missioners, Golders Hill, Wellington.