Finding First Aid at the Olympics
Greek doctor one of many deployed to support Games
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ATHENS, Greece - When Greek anesthesiologist Spiridon Chrisoulakis arrived at the Olympic stadium complex on July 15 he was given the keys to an empty room.
Tasked by his employers, the Greek military, to assist in the Olympic effort, Chrisoulakis had little more than two weeks to set up a fully functioning first aid center for Olympic fans.
No medical supplies, no air conditioning and no staff wasn't exactly Chrisoulakis's idea of a good time. But that clinic, one of only two units established to handle tourist ailments, can now take on almost any emergency that comes its way.
Chrisoulakis is one of the many invisible footsoldiers deployed by his country to support the Olympics, and he confessed a certain reluctance to take on the assignment. Chrisoulakis spent countless extra hours daily scrounging up an air conditioner, and then stocking the shelves with supplies donated by hospitals around the city.
“Now it’s good,” said Chrisoulakis, 35, who was born and raised on the Greek island of Crete. “We are organized. But the beginning was difficult.”
By the first week in August the clinic was ready and the nurses -- volunteers from around the world -- arrived.
“I’m grateful for what I know and if I can give back then I am at their disposal,” said Anastasia Kouvara, an Australian volunteer nurse whose parents are Greek.
The first patient of this particular day arrived at 10 a.m. -- a German man with blisters the size of golf balls on his toes and heels.
“You wouldn’t believe the number of people who come in with blisters,” said Kouvara. “If you are walking around the stadiums for hours you need to wear comfortable shoes.”
Set up to serve the spectators at the stadiums, more than 20 people a day take advantage of the center. The most common maladies? Headaches, toothaches, mosquito bites, and fever. Exactly what you can expect at a sports stadium in the middle of a hot summer, said the nurses. The most challenging patients however are the drug addicts attempting to score their next fix – the only people the staff will turn away.
“We get people from all walks of life,” said Kouvara.
Set up at the order of the Athens 2004 organizing committee and one of two in the Athens Olympic Sports Complex, the clinic is not large. Three beds line the walls and there is room for no more than eight people. Medical supplies are stacked on movable wire shelves – gauze and tape sits next to gloves and bandages. The smell of French-fries from the McDonald’s nearby sneaks in under the doors.
As the German man laced up his shoes a Greek man with bandages around his two middle fingers walked in, telling the nurse in Greek that he thinks his burnt fingertips need to be changed. Kouvara led him to a bed, and spent the next ten minutes spraying his bandages with water to make the removal less painful. The nurses are the front lines and hardest workers at this clinic.
“The doctor is the boss, we have to ask him to approve what we do. But we do all the work,” said Kouvara, as Chrisoulakis nodded in agreement.
For Chrisoulakis, normally employed at the Naval Hospital of Athens, practicing general medicine is boring, and he looks forward to the end of September when he will return to his regular full-time job.
“The most interesting thing I could treat here is anaphylactic shock,” said the doctor who will be here until the end of the Paralympic Games. “But no one comes in with that.”
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