T

he situation was hectic in North Lombok Regional Hospital when a strong earthquake shocked Lombok Island in West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) in the evening of Aug. 5.

North Lombok regency suffered the most fatalities and destruction from the deadly 7.0-magnitude quake. Thousands of buildings were damaged including the hospital. For the staff of 16 at the regional hospital on the evening shift their main concern was how to evacuate patients from the hospital building amid the ongoing strong tremors.

“There were many patients that night. But we didn’t have enough beds [for them]. We had to lay them out in the parking lot. Some of them even laid on the ground without any mats,” the hospital spokeswoman and administration staff Pipit Lestari told The Jakarta Post recently.

Lines of patients under tents on their beds with IV drops thronged the parking lot with medical personnel making sure they were all safe.

The number of patients quickly rose to 420 on the second day after the quake as a result of injuries caused by the disaster. Patients with severe injuries were quickly transported to other hospitals in the provincial capital of Mataram.

The deadly quake killed 460 people, injured 7,773 others and displaced 417,529 according to data from the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) on Wednesday.

After evacuation efforts, the hospital’s staff’s next priority was to obtain medicine to treat patients, both those who had been staying in the hospital and the new arrivals injured by the quake. It was not an easy task, Pipit recalled as the medicine was stored inside a heavily damaged part of the hospital. Getting in was seen as a highly risky move considering the unstable condition of the building. The concerns continued as hundreds of aftershocks shook the island.

“Unfortunately, there was no other way. We, including female staff members, had to enter the hospital to grab whatever we could find inside,” Pipit said.

Despite their families also being affected by the quake, the staff stayed at their posts and built a makeshift hospital in the parking lot. They checked their families in shelters erected by the government before quickly returning to the hospital to continue providing assistance.

“This is our duty. We can’t leave this place because this is our home. It’s the least we can do for our home,” Pipit said.

Amid a lack of personnel and limited equipment, the staff of the hospital focused on treating the patients as well as helping to deliver babies. There were at least 46 babies born under the canvas of the makeshift hospital as of Tuesday. The deliveries were conducted in one special closed tent provided by the BNPB.

“We can only perform normal deliveries here. We transported women who had complications or needed extra procedures to other hospitals in Mataram,” Dony Rosmana Bimantara, an obstetrician from the hospital, said.

The hospital staff’s hope of being able to care for their patients properly amid the emergency following the earthquake has been answered as aid has flowed into the regency.

Volunteers and doctors from other regions have arrived to assist the medical personnel. Medicine, medical equipment and other supplies, including tents, have been delivered to the hospital, allowing patients to be treated in a more proper environment.

A number of patients have also been transported to hospitals in Mataram that suffered less damage from the quake and the aftershocks that followed. The hospital buildings in Mataram are safe according to an assessment team from the School of Engineering at Yogyakarta-based Gadjah Mada University (UGM), which was sent to Lombok.

“In general, [the hospitals] are safe to be used to provide health care for patients,” UGM civil engineering expert Ashar Saputra said on Tuesday.

— Bambang Muryanto from Yogyakarta contributed to the story