Celebrated media medic, and long-time friend of Pegasus, Dr Roger Henderson is about to embark on a transcontinental adventure – volunteering his time and expertise to support doctors at a Malawi bush hospital. As soon as we heard about the incredibly worthwhile and admirable project, we wanted to know more, so the good doctor kindly put down a few words for our blog.

Check back in few weeks for the second installment and to see how he got on…

By Dr Roger Henderson

I am just about to leave for the heart of Africa and I’m not sure exactly how I feel. Excited? For sure. Homesick? Already. Curious? Massively. You see, I’m a GP who is going into Malawi to help run a bush hospital there, and I have no real idea as to what to expect.

What I do know is that this most poorest of countries has some of the happiest people in the world who appreciate anything you can do for them, and who will walk miles and miles in order to get medical attention. The hospital, based near Kamuzu and linked with an academy and orphanage, is sponsored by the charity Medic Malawi and I will be there for just under 3 weeks to do all I can to help the doctors who work there.

What is guaranteed is that I can forget anything to do with my normal day job in the creaking, overblown and hideously expensive NHS that we both despair of and love in equal measure. I will have my medical wits, my stethoscope, a bumper book of tropical diseases and not much else. Oh, except for 16,000 antibiotics filling one huge bag that I will haul through customs. These antibiotics, purchased with a charitable donation from Pegasus PR will, quite genuinely, save many lives.

In a way, I will be going to back to being an old-fashioned GP. You know, the type that used to take tonsils out on the kitchen table and deliver Mrs Goggins twins, all before a hearty fry-up and a fag. And I’m really looking forward to that. As general practice becomes more and more specialised it will be really refreshing to deliver babies, operate in a theatre and treat unusual conditions that really make you switch your brain on and think rather than automatically dial up a blood test or reach for a prescription pad.

The charity I am working for is called Medic Malawi, and I commend it to the house. This small charity has sponsored the building of an orphanage and hospital in Mthunthama in Malawi and I have no doubt I will be working with it for many years to come. I will write a detailed blog for Pegasus on my return, along with posting photos of the work I’ve done, but mobiles and emails are almost non existent there so will be incommunicado until I get back.

So, to Heathrow in 5 hours time, flight to Ethiopia and then on to Lilongwe. There’s just the important matter of loading up the iPod now and wondering how I’m going to explain away 20kg of pills in my bag to customs. See you on my return.