"Together, We Just Try To Help As Many People As We Can"

Wahida City Council members along with soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 15th Infantry recently renovated a building for use as a health clinic that will serve as the city's primary medical facility:

COMBAT OUTPOST CLEARY — Soldiers and leaders of the 1st Battalion, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team attended a ribbon cutting ceremony Dec. 11 to open a Health Clinic in Wahida.

According to Capt. Matthew Givens, from Columbus, Ga., non-lethal effects officer for the 1-15th Inf. Regt., city council members came to the regiment leaders four months ago with concerns about the existing clinic's lack of space and equipment.

Council members and Soldiers decided to renovate the existing building by adding more examination rooms, an emergency room and an upstairs apartment for the doctors with two bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom.

"This clinic gives the doctors a lot more to work with and they will be able to treat more patients," Givens said. "With the upstairs apartment, doctors can stay overnight. Before, the doctors would have to come from Baghdad early, then leave and go back to Baghdad that same night."

Wahida has no hospital, Givens said. The new clinic will serve as the city's primary medical facility. It has enough room to bed patients overnight instead of treating them and sending them home. "The clinic is going to be helpful to the Wahida citizens," Dr. Taher Awaed, clinic director, said through a translator. "The clinic is good, however, with a few more pieces of equipment, it will be perfect. But everyone is very grateful."

Givens said more equipment is on the way, including an x-ray machine. After the ribbon cutting ceremony, doctors and medics from the 203rd Brigade Support Battalion (BSB) and the 489th Civil Affairs (CA) Battalion, a reserve unit from Knoxville, Tenn., currently attached to the 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team (HBCT), held a free medical operation.

Soldiers used four of the new health clinic rooms to treat men, women, and children from all over the city. Patients came to the medical staff with ailments ranging from the common cold to blood pressure problems.

"This is a way for me to give back to humanity," said Capt. Aaron Wilson, from Watertown, N.Y., 203rd BSB battalion surgeon. "It's a way for me to show God's love for everyone."

When patients were ready to be seen, they explained their medical issue to a 3rd HBCT physician or medic through a translator. "Going through the translator is tough," said Sgt. 1st Class Wayne Pack, from Knoxville, Tenn., a medic in the 489th CA. "You have to concentrate. You can't lose focus. After the conversation is translated, I sometimes wonder if I'm getting the full story. I enjoy it though. We get to see a lot of sick people and that's what we do. Most of these people don't have a lot of money. If we didn't do this, they wouldn't be getting any medical attention at all."

Awaed and Wilson agree the free medical treatment was well received by all.

"No one has come up to me directly but I can feel it," Awaed said through a translator. "I can see it in their eyes. They are very thankful for the Coalition forces for their help. Together, we just try to help as many people as we can."

"Everyone I saw was so grateful," Wilson said. "They all smiled and said 'thank you'. I just wish I could do more."

The 1-15th Inf. Regt. and the 203rd BSB are assigned to the 3rd HBCT, 3rd Infantry Division, from Fort Benning, Ga., and have been deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom since March.