Sick and injured people living in camps had access to appropriate
medical facilities. But the prospect of return to rural areas with
few health facilities was a daunting one for patients who wanted to
go back to their homes. IOM responded by providing medical escorts
for at least 120 patients whom it believed were at risk.

Patients escorted included weakened infants and the elderly,
women with 32-week or more pregnancies, a one-week post-partum,
individuals with major disabilities like unstable chronic
illnesses, multiple amputations, spinal cord injuries and
paralysis, poorly-controlled epilepsy, psychosis, pulmonary,
cardiac and severe asthmatic cases.

Difficult road conditions, bad weather and landslides all posed
major challenges. With most of the hospitals and health centers
demolished in quake-affected areas, it was also difficult to find
suitable medical facilities for the future treatment of seriously
ill patients who insisted on returning home.

An IOM doctor, Noman Bukhari, escorted Andleeb, a 14-year-old
coma patient and her family from Islamabad’s H-11 IDP camp to
their home in Forward Kahuta in Bagh district, 250kms away over
rough roads.

“It was a real challenge to ensure that her condition did
not deteriorate. She was given neso-gastric feeds every hour and
the emergency oxygen apparatus was functioning all the way,”
said Dr Noman, who arranged the child’s transfer to the
partially damaged but functioning Forward Kahuta Tehsil HQ
hospital.

Since the earthquake, IOM medical teams have also medically
screened nearly 70,000 IDPs in camps to ensure that they were fit
to travel home. Of 69,572 people medically screened, 92% were
declared fit to travel. Some 5,562 individuals had minor ailments
or stable illness that allowed them to travel; 119 needed medical
escorts and 153 were declared unfit to travel and referred for
medical treatment.

“Sending people back home involves risk. So we hired local
staff and set up a system to identify potential health problems
linked to their travel,” says Bernard Kofi Opare, IOM’s
Islamabad-based Health Coordinator. “From declaring people
fit to travel to providing escorts and necessary medicines, we made
sure that people could return in relative safety.”

Medical screening averted potential disasters on several
occasions. In early May, four women at Fateh Jang camp in eastern
Punjab had mature pregnancies and were advised by IOM doctors not
to travel back home. They were moved to a medical facility at the
H-11 camp in Islamabad, where they subsequently gave birth. Later,
together with their newborns, they were provided with safe
transport to their villages in Pakistan-administered Kashmir.