Now, Health Matters with Daniel Martin. Welcome to Health Matters right here on CN A 938. I'm Daniel Martin. Thank you so much for joining me on today's edition. We're finding out more about the idea of a center for trauma. You see what's just happened on this Thursday, July 4th in the morning. Uh We've seen the opening of the National University Center for Trauma and I was fascinated to hear how n actually attends to something like 1000 300 severe and critical trauma cases every year.
This includes industrial accidents, pediatric trauma cases, and more to address this and of course, the specialty of trauma care as well. I was also intrigued to hear about how it's really going to focus this, the center on three key groups and that's Children, older adults and migrant workers as well. I've got with me, the Center director of the National University Center for Trauma, the National University Hospital, Dr Raj Mennen,
joining me on today's edition, Doctor Menon. Welcome to the show. Hello.
Thank you very much for having me.
Congratulations on the opening of the center. Is this the first of its kind in Singapore I'm curious,
I think there are many hospitals has managed trauma, but I think that's the first time that we have kind of centralized and regionalized trauma in such a way looking at not just the acute management of trauma, but going back all the way to preventing trauma and providing support for the patients. Well, after the trauma is over as well to kind of give a full spectrum of trauma care
and the National University Health System. And n in particular is one of the only full spectrum hospitals looking after both adults, Children, obstetric patients, and all of those are affected by trauma. So it covers a very wide spectrum
of patients who get injured daily in Singapore. And this is something that we are striving to address, not just by terms of treating the patients, but by preventing injury in the first place and also for support for these patients long after the initial injury is over and until they are returned back to families home, the community and go on to achieve their dreams.
That's very interesting because I think to a lot of us, we assume that trauma care is a very acute situation that we're just dealing with the trauma of the incident at that point in time. But to hear that it can be a very long process, I think is fascinating to us. I think a lot of us didn't realize that.
Yes. Um we tend to think of trauma. It's just that first one hour, 12 hours when they first brought in. But the journey just starts. There is true. The first hour is extremely critical. That's when we stop bleeding. We save the patient's life, restore and repair as much as we can.
But thereafter, the real journey starts the multiple surgeries that they would have to undergo the rehabilitation, strong work by our rehabil physicians of a physiotherapist, occupational therapists, social workers and speech therapists in trying to bring them back to where they should be and that they would want to be. And this just goes about and that's just about the
one aspects about the physical health. You also have the very significant psychological effect on patients, which can last for years after that. And when we talk about trauma, it's not just to a person is usually to the whole community, their families. And especially because trauma affects the young. You can imagine breadwinners being affected in the prime of their lives and
a whole life ahead of them being threatened. And I think this, this, this is what motivates us really to do whatever we can to get them to where they should be and where they want to be after a trauma.
So the journey goes on for years, many some of our patients do and keep on, we keep them on our follow for a longer term to until we are quite sure that they have really overcome all these effects of trauma and, and they can go on to achieve their dreams and their full potential, the rest of their lives
with such a wide scope that you've just painted out for us. It means you really need a very multidisciplinary team for their social workers, doctors, everybody.
Absolutely. In fact, I would say it goes well beyond the hospital, one of our key partners is, is the Singapore Civil Defense Force and they re engage with them regularly to talk discuss about cases, find ways of doing things better because that initial period is so important. But if I if I did you back even further, the best accident is one which does not happen, which means that trying to prevent injury is probably the key thing here. And that's where a
data driven approach where we look at our data. And we have identified these three groups mentioned geriatric trauma, which is our largest growing group of trauma, especially with our aging population, pediatric trauma, simply because it affects such a vulnerable group and in the west because we are very near the industrial Heartland of Singapore, the migrant workers and our work related accidents, which has granted a lot of media attention recently.
But certainly that's one these are the key groups we are trying to address, which means one of the functions of the center is actually reaching out to the community by going to active aging centers, preschools, primary schools, we just finished a session at one of the dormitories in to us where we went and spoke to 60 workers and we explained to them what happens
during a trauma. How do you protect yourself? How do you protect your friends who are injured and what will happen to you and how Singapore will look after you if you are injured to allay some of their fears because many of them sold breadwinners for their families back home. And suddenly this is an area of great concern for them. So I think it all starts there
on the other spectrum. As you quite rightly said, even after the trauma is over, we have a huge role to play there after looking at mental and physical health. And this is where one of the pillars of our new center is a survivorship program, which we started last year and that's the nation's first trauma Survivor program. And we have 14 of our patients who have recovered and they have volunteered to join this program to help others who have been injured, to provide support for them
and their families as well. And really this is when we look, we look at trauma, we no longer see victims of trauma, but rather we see heroes emerge from trauma itself and they sacrifice their journeys they have gone through is so heartening and inspiring. And it is a real testament to how much courage they have exhibited during this period of time. And
so you think the Center will shine a spotlight on that.
That's right. So we organize activities every couple of months with them, bringing them together and it's so dynamic that, you know, when you first brought them together, it's all about sharing the experiences. But now that the community has been built up, they are looking to, they, they are interacting with themselves, they are organizing activities for each other and their families and more critically, they are also offering support for our
newly injured patients as well. So some to lend a helping hand and a kind of a guide as, as a, as a light house for these patients that there is hope at the end of the day with work, we have faith in the system, faith in yourself and the family that you know, there is a brighter day ahead and that's what we want, that's what we want our patients to feel and so important in their recovery journey for them to feel. That
sounds like a support group in a way,
in a way. It is a support group. But we're hoping to do is not just about mutual support for those in the group, but extending beyond to active patients who are getting, getting injured and supporting themselves and their families.
I was also I'm very happy to see that this is coalescing in the form of the center and that we have this long term mindset about it and shining the spotlight on the heroes that emerge and giving back and supporting each other in that way as well. But the definition of what would qualify as a trauma event is so wide, the spectrum can be so absolutely wide.
I mean, I think most of us, we assume that we think of an industrial accident or an accident on the road, what we saw happen at the junction tragically at Tampines or? But would it also include things on a different scale like the emergency landing of SQ 312 and the people on board and things like that. What is the scope?
Absolutely. You're quite right. Trauma has a very wide scope. I mean, it can go from the most minor of injuries to really devastating injuries and it covers the whole body head to toe, which is why it's a whole team effort. Yeah. So I'm a general surgeon and I I handle trauma cases and we deal principally with stopping bleeding, controlling injuries in the chest and the abdominal area. But I work closely with our emergency physicians to stabilize the patients neurosurgeons to
help with significant brain injuries. Our orthopedic and hand and reconstructive surgeons to deal with injuries to the limbs. Our alo facial surgeons, our plastic surgeons and our ear, nose and throat surgeons and our plastic surgeons to deal with injuries in the face and then the whole team which comes in, you'll be surprised that when you, when we activate a cold trauma, which is a hyper acute response for the most critically sick patients in the hospital.
There are easily about 30 odd people convert on a patient. But regardless of the timing of the day, it could be at 2 a.m. And when the call goes out, we have so many people converging and this ranges again, not just the doctors but the nurses, patients, patient service associates, our quarters, all of them kind of jumping in because the initial period is so so crucial and we got to kind of organize to make sure that the correct surgeries get done in sequence,
that the key ones get done first. And it's kind of kind of managing and it's like being managing an orchestra and conducting this whole process to make sure that we deal with injuries that need to be dealt with early and the rest we stage it out looking after both the body as well as its physiology as well.
But does that mean that all traffic accidents will fall under the trauma care center?
It would, I would say that the majority of injuries in Singapore tend to be what we call blunt injuries as compared and compared to penetrating injuries, which are usually due to stabs or gunshots, which thankfully we don't have in Singapore, but we have a large amount of a large volume of blunt trauma, principally from faults as which can be from any level all road traffic collisions, as you rightly said. Um and the impact of these injuries can be minor or it can go all the way to very severe.
If you, if you look at the hospitals in the West, we look after 50,000 injured patients a year as a whole for the whole spectrum of injuries and of which about 500 of them are the hyper acute ones a year, which these are the ones which are, you know, it's really, if you come to the hospital a bit later, your life is really going to be threatened. And that's why these responses are so important to try to bring our patients to the operating theater
as quickly as possible. Stop the bleeding, stabilize the patient. And then we begin the work of reconstructing and repairing and restoring the rest of your body and health in the coming in the coming days and weeks ahead. So it is really a marathon. It is a really long, it's a long journey and it doesn't stop on the charge from the hospitals, you bring them to our rehabilitation centers, you go back to the homes. Community support is very important. And um it's uh it's which is why it's such
a long and important journey. We often don't think about all these aspects of trauma. I think of it as just the first one hour. But actually it can, it can last for months as well in the after effects. And that's why having the survivorship program is so important to help patients peace with this and to give them a the tunnel is long, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel and we will help you get there.
It's been fascinating learning about the role that this will play in the health landscape in Singapore. Congratulations. Once again, Doctor Men on the opening of the center. And thank you for speaking to my listeners all about it. My guest on the program Center, Director of the National University Center for Trauma at the National University Hospital. Dr Raj Men. Joining us on today's edition of Health Matters.
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