Surgeon Andre Cheah carefully removing a patient’s facial tumor under the help of a medical assistant.

Ophthalmologist Dr. Paul Zhao (left) has been a frequent participant in the medical missions. He too did not miss the opportunity this time to provide surgery for the poor patients.

The medical personnel make it a point to keep company with the operated patients in the recovery room with their family members.

Dr Maung Than Zaw Oo, original from Thailand and now practices dentistry in Singapore, is performing a tooth extraction while a volunteer stood by his side to help comforting the panicked patient.

Dr. Guo Zhong Fu, a Chinese Medicine practitioner for years, applying acupuncture treatment on a patient’s head.

Volunteer Xu Li Mei holding tight to a lady’s hand as she leaned closer to her for Nurse Zhou Lai Hao to apply medication for her festered ears.

Care recipient turned volunteer Dedy Idrayanto was happy to be able to contribute to the mission by helping with checking blood pressure for the patients.

The TIMA members and volunteers not only had their holidays spent on the Mission, they even took time from their busy schedules to practice a song’s sign language and finally performed it in the Mission’s closing ceremony.

“Free massage service for you and me”. Everyone cares for everyone as a family in the Mission.

Weak at both her legs, a granny who just had eye surgery was quickly attended by volunteer Huang Shun Wei and Li Xin Neng to help her to the side.

Bro Xu Dao Fang from KL teasing a little boy waiting for his turn for cleft lips operation.  Every year in Indonesia there are about 10,000 babies born with this kind of anomalies.

Since 2000, and every year thereafter, the medical team and volunteers of Tzu Chi Singapore Branch would cross over to Batam Island to provide free medical services to the needy. The 9th mission took place on 9th March 2007 following eight successful missions over the past seven years. These missions have not only benefited numerous poor and needy residents, it has also inspired many Batam people to join in the path of Great Love.

On this trip, there were 114 TIMA members and 195 volunteers from Singapore. On top of that, TIMA members and volunteers from Malaysia and Batam also joined in making a total force of over 400.

According to Brother David Liu, CEO of Tzu Chi Singapore branch, the planning for the medical mission in Batam has become more and more complex over time as two locations were involved this time. Furthermore, there are lesser and lesser patients in Batam Island itself now. Many of the patients requiring surgery had to be brought in from the neighboring islands. Despite all that, Brother Liu was grateful that there was an overwhelming response from the TIMA members and the volunteers who registered to participate in this mission.

To ensure a smooth running of the free clinic, a preparatory team was dispatched two days earlier for the site setup. The free clinic this time round was held at two separate locations following all the hard work and coordination of the volunteers from Singapore and Indonesia. The sites were located at Saanggar Kegiatan Belajar (next to Batu Aji Hospital) and Puskesmas Sei Panas Hospital respectively.

Big Challenge to co-ordination work

Saanggar Kegiatan Belajar is a special school with a mission of helping children with learning difficulty or facing financial difficulty. The principal, Enik, came to know about Tzu Chi in the 2003 Tzu Chi Free Clinic and was very much impressed and moved by what she learned. Later in 2005, the school provided classrooms as recuperation centres for those patients who underwent operations. In this recent mission, she took up an even bigger role by offering the entire school to be converted to a temporary clinic for general practice, dentistry, Chinese medicine, and optical care. She even arranged for the students to have two days off school in order to ensure a smooth operation.

For general surgery such as cleft lips, lumps, hernia, cataract and so on, these were being carried out in the Puskesmas Sei Panas Hospital with the assistance of the Head of Health Department in Batam.

The free clinics held by Tzu Chi in the past have benefited many needy patients in Batam itself over the years as can be noted from the number of patients coming in for treatment. However, some of the needy patients from the neighboring Riau Islands were not aware of the service initially due to the lack of communication channels but were informed on time eventually. The free clinic carried out this time has seen 130 patients who needed surgery from Bengkalis, Tanjong Balai, Tanjong Pinang as well as Karimun Island.

Doubtful of the free service, the wife of the Bengkali District Head brought over 50 ill patients to Batam to see it with her own eyes.

And the “hearsay” was proved to be true.

Bidding goodbye to a half century birth defect

For the past forty-six years, Juminah, who was born with cleft lip, never thought that this birth defect of hers would be gone one day.

Juminah lives in Bengkalis, an island 3-4 hour boat ride from Batam Island. A poor widow with two married adult children and three grandchildren, she never thought of seeking medical attention. This Free Clinic, albeit late, brought some cheers to her, as her face would look normal soon.

After a two-and-a-half hour restorative procedure, Dr Vincent Ng Siew Weng from Singapore successfully erased this forty-six year old misery. Juminah thanked Dr Ng and the volunteers profusely after the operation. In the recovery area, showing a four and six with her fingers, as she was unable to speak clearly after the surgery, Juminah was full of emotions trying to tell everyone that she had finally bid goodbye to a misery of 46 years.

Meisya’s life saviour

Meisya, a 6 year old girl, was born with distorted lips, a smaller left ear and several grape-sized lumps on her helix. Even though she has big shining eyes, she has rather low self-esteem because of her deformed face. Despite the need to travel an hour by boat from her hometown Tanjong Pinang to Batam, her pregnant mother, Marianah, still insisted to bring her here for treatment.

It hurts Marianah’s heart whenever Meisya asked why she was born that way. With the meager income from her husband who does odd job, she barely managed to make ends meet. As such, she never dreamt that she could bring her daughter for medical treatment. She could only pray and hope that one day when she is financially able, she would send her for treatment. Her prayer was finally answered by Tzu Chi’s Free Clinic.

The operation on Meisya was slightly more delicate as it involved her facial nerves. Post operation, she was in deep sleep but her life was changed forever when she woke up.

“It’s indeed satisfying to see the poor patients rediscover their self-esteem after the surgeries and have their lives changed for the better,” said Dr Ng.

Great doctor from a distant land

Dr. Burton Golub was in Singapore on business when he happened to pass by Tzu Chi Free Clinic at Chinatown one day. There he met Dr Kuo Chung Fu and got to know of the medical mission. He signed up there and then and later flew in from the States specially to participate in this Free Clinic.

At the Free Clinic, Dr. Burton Golub said that he had witnessed the congregation of “Loving Hearts” as joy and happiness were clearly apparent on everyone’s face.

Besides being amazed by the large scale Free Clinic, he also discovered that all volunteers participated on an equal footing, including the CEO, Brother David Liu, who also took part in comforting and supporting the patients. This force of transcending profession, social status, race and boundary, gave him a very positive impression of Tzu Chi.

The two full day free clinic has successfully treated a total of 4245 patients, including 28 cases of cleft lips for children, 11 cases of tumor, 229 cases of adult clefts and tumor, 18 cases of child’s hernia, 40 cases of adult’s hernia, 5 cases of thyroid, 1513 general medicine, 840 cases of Traditional Chinese Medicine, 1006 cases of dental treatment, 36 cases of eye treatment and 519 optical cases.

Although the going was tough and physically tiring, everyone is looking forward to participate in another mission in the near future. Obviously, the thought that this mission has helped changed another person’s life has brought immense joy to the volunteers and medical team alike.