Jacquie’s heartfelt mission
The TV star’s heartwarming Fiji getaway
She spent six years playing nurse Wendy Cooper on Shortland Street, but nothing could have prepared Jacqueline Nairn for the real-life medical dramas that unfolded before her eyes on a recent holiday in Fiji.
The flame-haired actress – who these days works behind the scenes as a director for New Zealand’s favourite soap – had visions of sandy white beaches and poolside loungers when she booked some much-needed R&R in the Pacific paradise in September, but fate had other plans for her.
“A friend asked if I’d be interested in joining her and the Hearts 4 Kids team for a few days – and I was in!” she tells.
Hearts 4 Kids is a volunteer medical team from NZ that travels to Fiji every year to perform congenital heart surgery on babies and children, and Jacquie’s decision to spend part of her holiday watching lives being saved is something she’ll hold dear for the rest of her life.
“When I first arrived, I felt overwhelmed at all the brandnew chest scars and the young lives the team was saving,” shares Jacquie, 46. “It was unbelievably heartwarming.”
The 30-strong team – led by top Kiwi paediatric cardiac surgeon Dr Kirsten Finucane – spent 10 days in Suva operating on children, from newborns to teenagers, who had no hope of a future without highly specialised medical intervention.
Jacquie’s eyes mist up as she recounts meeting tiny 2.2kg newborn Mosese lying alone in a cot after undergoing surgery.
“It broke my heart – he looked so fragile,” shares the former teacher. “His nurse told me he was a twin and his mum was in intensive care with the other one. She was torn between two premature babies in different wards. What a horrible predicament! My heart went out to her and I stayed with her son a while longer, hoping that it might help.”
Then there was the 16-year-old girl who lay curled in her mother’s arms before her operation. “Her mum explained to me that she was scared and I realised, ‘Of course she is. She’s old enough to understand exactly what is about to happen.’”
Nurse in paradise
It was times like this that Jacquie was able to put her Shortland Street fame to good use. The soap is a hot favourite in Fiji and although Jacquie’s character was written out in 2016, she was instantly recognisable to the receptive locals.
“Word travelled quickly that there was someone from Shortland Street in the building and given that I’m a redhead, I was a bit like a roving road cone – super-easy to spot!” she laughs. “It took a while to get anywhere.
“But the advantage is that people feel like they know you, so I was able to take this scared 16-year-old’s hand and tell her how much better the other kids were feeling who’d already had their operations. She smiled and nodded.”
The conditions in the hospital were “an eye-opener”, recalls Jacquie. “There were people everywhere, security guards, terrible heat, cockroaches, buildings in dire need of repair
and a confronting lack of resources. There is no toilet paper – you have to take your own.”
The Kiwi volunteers, however, didn’t bat an eyelid as they spent every waking hour saving the lives of kids like 10-year-old Vilikesa, who needed a replacement heart valve after contracting rheumatic heart disease.
“At one point, I sat with Dr Finucane as she had a quick lunch break,” tells Jacquie. “She’d saved a life that morning and was going to save two more that afternoon, but she’s so unassuming, you’d walk past her in the street and not think anything of it. Bizarrely, it was me, a pretend nurse from Shortland Street, who was getting all the attention while the real hero was eating a chicken sandwich!”
Before Jacquie said goodbye to the Hearts 4 Kids team, she was thrilled to see a young patient, who before her operation didn’t have the strength to walk on her own, sprinting down the corridor, doing skids in her socks.
“And baby Mosese opened his fist and wrapped his tiny fingers around my little finger,” she says. “His eyes were open, his face looked plumper and he looked so much better than the day before. I whispered, ‘You’re meant to be here, little guy.’”
Jacquie has nothing but admiration for the Hearts 4 Kids team and the incredible amount of work they do in 10 short days. “They don’t get paid to do this,” she explains. “Some of them use part of their annual leave to keep coming back each year and most of them will be back at work the day they return home. They’re legends and I can’t think of a time when I’ve been prouder to be a New Zealander.”