Community doctor

Working for the community takes away precious time meant for one's family. It takes away your supposed shared memories which may lead to regrets. Thus, people working for so long in the community are becoming a rare breed.

“It takes a lot of passion and compassion and of course commitment to your work,” Doctor Julinda Acosta, Davao City Health Office (CHO) Technical Division head, said when asked how she managed to serve Dabawenyos for the past 31 years attending to their health concerns.

Acosta said she was just fortunate to find earlier what she really wanted to do in life.

After finishing Medicine in 1985 at the Davao Medical School Foun-

dation, she applied in the local government unit (LGU) of Davao City. She was then assigned in Bunawan and Paquibato District’s medical clinics in 1987, the latter known to be a rebel-infested area at the time.

In 2001, reorganization happened and she was transferred to Sasa Health District. Her team, composed of a doctor, nurse and a midwife, experienced a life and death situation. In one of the communities she was monitoring, they were called out for a pregnant woman who gave birth through a quack doctor in the area. However, one of the twins was still inside the womb positioned horizontally. Acosta said they were able to deliver the baby successfully but the mother was bleeding and they lacked medical equipment to save her.

“The midwife I asked to get dextrose took too long to come back. I know then I had to do something or the mother will be harmed, so I ran back to the clinic since no vehicle was available. I don’t even know how far it was,” Acosta said, adding she was five months pregnant at the time.

On her way back from getting the dextrose, among others, she hitched on a private truck but they figured in an accident. She had to run again as fast as she could, not minding her own bruises. In the end, they saved everyone. Now, the twins are both successful in their own professions – one is a police officer while the other one is now a cruise liner staff abroad.

Only in movies do we see stories like this. But heroism happens almost every day, made by ordinary people with extraordinary passion to help. /