April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
MEDICAL MISSIONARY
Native of Diocese describes life as a doctor in Sudan
What gets to him is losing patients.
"By far, that's the hardest part, more than long hours or frustrations," he told The Evangelist. "It can paralyze you with grief."
Sometimes, it's too late to save a patient by the time the person makes the trek to the compound from deep in the Nuba Mountains in South Kordofan, a rebel-held territory. But Dr. Catena wrestles with himself when someone dies on the operating table.
"You always have to wonder what went wrong," he said. "I know that in the end, I'm not so much responsible for who lives and who dies. That's God's role. It's very humbling. That's the lesson I try to take out of it. I think, in the west, we have this idea that we control our own destiny, and we don't."
Native of Diocese
Dr. Catena grew up in Amsterdam and attended St. Michael's Church there. His brother, Rev. Paul Catena, is pastor of Sacred Heart parish in Margaretville. Dr. Catena spoke with The Evangelist during a visit home from Sudan, where he is the only doctor, surgeon and specialist at Mother of Mercy Hospital.
The hospital has grown from 80 beds to 300 beds since he helped found it, but often treats up to 400 patients at a time. He treats patients with injuries from car accidents and shooting accidents, as well as illnesses like leprosy, intestinal and obstetrical diseases, cancer, malaria and pneumonia.
"You have to treat a much broader variety of disease than is expected of you in the U.S.," Dr. Catena said.
Before the hospital existed, the people consulted witch doctors.
"They don't have a western concept of disease," the doctor explained. "Some people are still doing these things. They had this for a thousand years."
Toll of war
More and more hospital cases have been war-related since 2011, when the government of Sudan in Khartoum started attacking rebels and then attacked the general population. That new conflict followed decades of civil war. A 2005 peace agreement led to interim governments in the north and south until June 2011, when a referendum led to the creation of South Sudan as a separate country.
The futures of the border states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile were never determined, and their people are now threatened by airstrikes, gunfire, missiles, tank blasts and more. It's too dangerous for farmers to plant and harvest crops, and the government has cut off medical supplies and blocked humanitarian aid.
"The people do not want to be part of the Khartoum government," Dr. Catena said. "This government is bad news."
Double duty
When the new conflict started and bombing began nearby, the physician stayed behind as fellow missionaries fled for safety. He was forced to learn how to anesthetize patients, and successfully performed about 200 surgeries in the two months it took for the anesthesiologist to return.
"This, to me, was a very clear sign that God was on our side," he said. "It's the grace of God that's allowing us to do this work."
Dr. Catena, a volunteer through the Catholic Medical Mission Board, has been called a hero by countless organizations and publications. He considers his role that of "a lay missionary of the Catholic Church, to be there as a presence." He saw more than 4,000 inpatients and more than 20,000 outpatients last year.
The people were dubious of Dr. Catena and his staff at first, accusing them of being agents of the north.
"This is part of the missionary thing: You just stick it out and show them the love of Christ with what you're doing," said the doctor. "People are coming around and beginning to trust us. It takes a while for them to warm up to somebody, but once they do, they really latch onto you."
Dr. Catena and a few nurses train locals, some of whom have only reached ninth grade because schools closed when the war started, and send some students to nursing schools in South Sudan, praying for their return. There are currently about 135 people on the hospital's staff, including cleaners, pharmacists and lab technicians. Supplies are replenished just twice a year, and the hospital has water and electricity, a rarity in the area.
Doctor's resume
Dr. Catena earned a degree in mechanical engineering at Brown University in Providence, R.I., but realized the field wouldn't lend itself to mission work. He entered medical school at Duke University in Durham, N.C., on a U.S. Navy scholarship so he could be debt-free when he went abroad.
He served five years as a Navy medical officer and then fulfilled his residency in family medicine at a hospital in Indiana. In 1999, he was sent to Mutomo and Nairbobi, Kenya, where he spent almost eight years learning how to do surgeries.
An award from Brown drew him home in February after more than two years without seeing his friends and siblings. He was in high demand around the Albany Diocese and the East Coast, giving talks at hospitals and raising money.
Culture shock
Being back in the U.S. is always a bit of a culture shock, Dr. Catena said: "The pace of life always catches me. There is a materialism here. It's just not there [in South Kordofan]. People [there] are just not consumed with things. It's irrelevant. The people tend to focus on relationships and aren't in a rush.
"When you come back," he continued, "some of the stuff just seems unimportant, frivolous. But it's very difficult to separate yourself from the society you live in."
Dr. Catena hopes to raise awareness about the living conditions in the Nuba Mountains and "to have people [in the U.S.] realize what we've been given in this country. Try to share whatever you have anywhere you can. You don't have to go to Sudan. It can be in your backyard. [Use] whatever gifts you're given."[[In-content Ad]]
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