Thoughts on Medevacs – Part II

 Flash forward 11 years, through five other medevacs. One other has involved a special plane and the rest have been on commercial flights, but each stressful in its own way.

All focus and energy for several days is on getting the person out of Mali and to a place where they can get the help they need. People chip in from all sides, much like people do everywhere when someone is in the hospital or has a long illness.

This time around our evacuee was hanging something on the wall at school last Thursday, (Nov 11) and fell off the chair. She broke something in her foot that will require surgery in the US.

So we began the medevac process on Tuesday morning. This was a relatively "easy" medevac - no special plane and no one’s life hanging in the balance. But still stressful, for me calling and emailing folks around the world – and trying to manage the tiling project begun in my apartment that same day.  Others were driving our patient hither and yon to the clinic [thankfully better than the one we had in 2000].

On Wednesday Nov 16, they got the "okay to travel" letter from the local doctor, which specified that we needed a wheelchair at the airport. Then they did the pre-check in at Air France in town (drop off bags, get boarding pass). They were told there’d be a wheelchair at the door of the airport.

So our patient, her roommate and I headed for the airport at 9:15 pm for the 11:40 flight. Wouldn’t you know it, no wheelchair at the door of the airport? The others were waiting in the car and so I went in to the Air France counter and they said, "Oh yeah." They called someone and said it would be coming. But they told me that we could in no circumstances take it TO THE CURB or even outside the front door. If the patient couldn't walk at all, the doctor would have ordered an ambulance. So there!

While we waited, I got our patient and she walked on crutches through the crowd up to the front door. There was a chair just inside where she sat with her roommate, while I went running around to Air France trying to get someone to pay attention.

“Aw ka chaise ma na fɔlɔ?” ("What? Your chair hasn't come yet?") They kept calling someone but never seemed to be terribly concerned about finding it.
I did eventually confirm that the wheelchairs were indeed at the airport and not at someone's house.

Eventually, when they started calling Air France people to the departure lounge, I went up to the nice policeman, Mr. Dembele, at the front door and asked if he could help us. This is where it pays to speak some Bambara. He very kindly left his post, and took me and my passport back through ALL the security checks, saying all the while in Bambara, "His wife is at the front and needs a wheelchair." I did not correct this misassumption. 

We went out the back of the airport and walked right past 3 Wheelchairs. [Note to airport staff: Why not keep these by the front door instead of out on the tarmac?] We went into some sort of operations control room with bright lights and the policeman asked about a wheelchair. They said, "Oh yeah, Air France has been asking for that! It hasn't come yet?" So they got on the radio and called someone named Boubacar.
We went back inside, past the 3 wheelchairs, past all the security points, to the front door and in a few minutes Boubacar arrived with the wheelchair.

The rest was fairly straight forward. With the wheelchair, we were escorted through all sorts of lines. Eventually they took her outside and about 3 blocks down to the airplane and into the little metal room that they put the food in. It has an elevator and gets lifted up to the plane - the only way to avoid the steep metal steps up to the plane.

The good news is that she made it to the US without further incident, and had surgery on Monday November 21. Do pray for that!

All of this got me to thinking about medevacs.

Deep Thought #1: How do we spell “medevac”, especially when you conjugate it: Medevacking? Medevacing? Medevacked? Medevaced? Sometimes I settle for “medevacuated” but that is just too long.

Deep Thought #2: We mobilize the infantry and move heaven and earth to get someone out of the country and to proper medical attention.  But how often do we pay so much attention to the spiritual health of our friends, family and ourselves?

We have the image of the Good Shepherd and the Good Samaritan, who bind up the wounds of the sick and the broken hearted.

Ezekiel 34:16 “I will search for my lost ones who strayed away, and I will bring them safely home again. I will bandage the injured and strengthen the weak.”

If you think about it, what is a sabbatical if not a time of convalescence for the soul?

Sometimes with a medevac, the person is fully conscious and able to make decisions and so there is much less intervention on the part of those helping out.  Sometimes, we come to the recognition on our own that our soul needs some help and we cry out to those around us.

But other times, those being medevacked are unconscious and the spouse is too shaken up to make decisions and so the administration has to help make those difficult decisions to evacuate or not.

Who do you know that needs someone to come alongside and shake them up a bit to their need for help?

Do you have any wheelchairs sitting tucked away at the back of the airport, far from those who need them? What resources and help do you have that is hidden away, far from those who need it?

We all need help sometimes, someone to take us by the hand to throne room where there is help for the broken-hearted.

The image of the Mr. Dembele, the Policeman, lingers with me. I had a passport but he took it in hand and led me past the immigration check, the yellow-fever check point, the security scan (we beeped going through the scanner) and even out the back door onto the tarmac and into the control room where mere mortals do not go. All that was required was a word from his mouth and we were waived through.

I could not help but think of Jesus who is our high-priest and who takes us and leads us directly before the throne of God. He is there to help us and to intercede.