Medics head to Africa to help youngsters

EXPERTS from Swansea Bay have given up their own time to help children with abnormalities in Africa.

- IAN LEWIS

The six-strong group from Swansea Bay University Health Board was invited to the Cure International Children's Hospital in Bulawayo in Zimbabwe, to work with medics there treating youngsters with hypospadias.

The trip was intended to help setup a new service for the Cure Hospital, by operating on a variety of individuals with hypospadias, a malformation of the urethra which means it opens on the underside of the penis, to assist the training of local surgeons from plastic surgery and urology. The team also helped to train the ward and outpatient nursing teams in pre and postoperative care.

Consultant paediatric plastic surgeon Nick Wilson-Jones said: "As we experience in the UK, hypospadias is a taboo subject, and many families believe their child is the only child with the condition. Our training aim was to help the hospital carry out more cases themselves, but also to increase awareness of hypospadias. It is an unusual but common condition, including in the UK.