I arrived at the hospital last week and was immediately pulled into the kind of scene that forces your brain to shift into high gear – the kind where time warps and your senses sharpen. A group of nurses were at the bedside of a restless patient, physically restraining him.…

Recently, someone asked me what it’s like to live out in Freetown rather than on the ship – like the 99% of people serving with Mercy Ships here in Sierra Leone. My surface-level answer was trying to explain both the chaos and the joy that life in the city brings.…

“No.” A simple word, yet it carries so much weight. As a nurse mentor in Sierra Leone, I have learned that “no” is often the hardest part of the job. In a place where medical resources are scarce, where suffering is woven into the fabric of daily life, and where…

Some moments in the hospital stay with me long after I leave. Admittedly, these often come from the paediatric ward (I am a paeds nurse after all!) but they don’t always come from big, dramatic events, often they come from the smallest interactions—ones that don’t seem significant until I take…

“Why Sierra Leone?” It’s a question I hear often, and I’ve become adept at giving the quick, digestible answer. “The need is just so big” I’ll say. “The lack of access to healthcare and education.” Those answers are true. They’re compelling and easy to understand. They satisfy the polite curiosity…

In the pediatric ward of Connaught Hospital, a heartwarming friendship has blossomed between two little boys, just six and seven years old, who are facing unimaginable challenges. Both sustained serious injuries to their arms, but complications arose when their families, desperate to find help, first turned to traditional healers. Now,…

In Sierra Leone, the interplay between Muslims and Christians is something truly remarkable. It’s woven into the daily rhythms of life, something you notice even more when you live and work here. Unlike in many parts of the world where religion can be a source of division, Sierra Leone offers…