British surgeon carries out amputation in Congo by text

A doctor volunteering in war-torn Congo performed a life-saving amputation on a teenage boy using text message instructions from a colleague in London.

Vascular surgeon David Nott was working 24-hour shifts with medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in Rutshuru when he came across the 16-year-old.



His left arm had been ripped off, either in an accident or as a result of the fighting between Congolese and rebel troops, and was badly infected and gangrenous.

Mr Nott, 52 and a surgeon at Charing Cross Hospital, in west London, said: "He was dying. He had about two or three days to live when I saw him." He knew that the teenager's only hope of survival was a forequarter amputation, a huge operation which requires the surgeon to remove the collar bone and shoulder blade.


Photo from here.

He had never performed the operation but knew a colleague from the UK who had. "I texted him and he texted back step by step instructions on how to do it."

Despite the hurdles, the operation, performed in October, was a success and the teenager made a full recovery.