Surgeon James Masson reflects on 18 volunteer trips

After 18 volunteer trips to countries like Vietnam, Papua New Guinea and Fiji, he has seen the best and worst of what their health systems have to offer.

Currently based in The Rock, he said his experiences overseas have given him a new perspective on Australian medicine.

"You go to these countries just across the water, like New Guinea, and it's often very third-world medicine you're dealing with. Those people don't have regular access to the sorts of surgeries we can provide," he said.

"It's enormous and never ending ... people will hear there's a team coming from Australia or somewhere else and hundreds and hundreds of people will turn up, hoping they might get an operation.

"It's always an eye-opener going to these poorer countries to see how people live, and then come back here ... it's often quite frustrating, because even in regional rural NSW people are often much more demanding."

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Dr Masson's volunteer trips are run by not-for-profit organisation Interplast, which is celebrating its 40^th anniversary.

Interplast works to improve the quality of life for people with conditions with plastic surgery, operating on conditions like cleft palates and tumours.

After finishing his basic training as a surgeon in 1993, Dr Masson began work with Interplast in 1998. After undertaking aid trips to New Guinea and Fiji, he was made program director in Vietnam 10 years ago.

Dr Masson said one of the most common problems he treats are burn-related scarring and contractures.

"You might wonder why people get burnt in the New Guinea highlands, where it's very cold," he said.

"Families often live in huts and have a fire in the middle of the hut to keep warm. Children in particular roll into fires.

"In Vietnam, most burns are caused by battery acid being thrown at women as a form of domestic violence, which is very sad and horrible."

Interplast doctors are increasingly spending their time training doctors to perform the same vital work they do.

This reduces their long-term need for aid work and creates the knowledge base for these surgeries to be performed by local doctors.

This includes programs that bring Pacific Island doctors to Australia to learn to perform basic plastic surgeries like skin flaps - a procedure similar to a skin graft that involves stretching rather than relocating skin.

Dr Masson said the abilities of his overseas peers showed there was no lack of ability or willingness among local doctors to perform these surgeries. The main barrier is access to the expertise and equipment they need to perform them.

"There was this surgeon from Kiribas who sent me a text that said, 'James I've got this patient who's come off his motorbike and he's got this big hole in his leg'," he said.

"He drew it [the skin flap] on the patient, and asked what I thought. I said I thought it would be great.

"The next day, he sent me a photo of the flap, and he'd done it perfectly - as well as I could have done."

You can support the work Dr Masson and his colleagues performs overseas via Interplast's website.

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