The Pacific Angels treated more than 2000 patients in their first three days of service here.

Doctors, dentists and pharmacists from the U.S., Papua New Guinea and the Australian, New Zealand, Indonesian and Philippine militaries, along with 32 volunteers from the provincial hospital and local villages, treated more than 600 patients a day at Unggai Primary School in the opening half-week of Pacific Angel 15-4. 

The patients came from all over PNG, with many of the patients walking nearly two days on bare feet to get a chance to be treated by the multi-national medical team. For some of the patients, this was the first time they have been to a clinic in decades, despite injuries or problems with their bones and teeth.

The treatments ranged from optometry care, dental, family care and women's health to physical therapy and pharmaceutical services.

"We are trying to work with the local military and civilians to improve their disaster response capabilities, specifically their command and control capabilities, and trying to work with our local health system partners to help treat some of the local populations," said U.S. Air Force Col. Joseph Anderson, Headquarters Pacific Air Forces command surgeon.

Volunteer translators and student nurses worked quickly to get hundreds of patients registered for treatment and sent to the right section for treatment and examinations.

"One of the most important aspects of having so many countries working simultaneously together is to not only get to know each other, but to understand how each other works" Anderson said. "One of the most important things here is meeting and greeting and working with our counterparts, gaining confidence in each other and building those relationships that will help us respond better in the future."

One of the ways the countries will understand how each other works is by conducting a series of subject-matter expert exchanges, said Australian air force Wing Commander Brent Barker, a flight surgeon on exchange with PACAF.

In the exchanges, doctors from five Pacific nations discuss scenarios with each other, the local university students and the local hospital and then exchange ideas about how they deal with infectious diseases, bacteria and disasters. They also visit both local and PACANGEL clinics to learn how they run and how the teams can make health response missions run as smoothly as possible.

"A big learning point in this sort of disaster scenario is that a disaster might wipe out a lot of your existing civil services structures, but that something like a school can easily transform into an impromptu clinic and medical facility," Barker said. "I hope our health professional colleagues take away from this exchange that it is good to take people out of their comfort zone and bring them to the community and see that a lot is possible with a little."

Barker continued by saying he wants countries to take away the contacts that are made here during Pacific Angel, because they are so valuable for working together in the future.

Officially in its eighth year, Operation Pacific Angel is a joint humanitarian assistance engagement designed to reach out to partner nations and help them develop their medical and disaster relief capabilities, and in so doing help provide increased levels of security to the entire region.