Hamlin Fistula: Napier-born doctor Reg Hamlin’s life-saving legacy lives on

Hamlin Fistula NZ chairwoman Joli Wescombe (left) will speak next week about continuing the incredible legacy left by Napier-born doctor Reg Hamlin and wife Catherine.

Four years after the death of its co-founder, the passion project of a Napier-born doctor with a desire to help those less fortunate is still going as strong as ever. Ahead of a special homecoming event next week, Mitchell Hageman talks to the people continuing the legacy of the Hamlin Fistula Foundation and how one doctor from Hawke’s Bay changed the course of history.

“The fistula patients will break your hearts,” Napier’s Reg Hamlin was told when he first arrived in Ethiopia in 1959 to establish a training school for midwives.

Break his heart they did. The seasoned gynaecologist was devastated by the sight of a young woman in urine-soaked ragged clothes, sitting alone in the outpatients’ department away from the other waiting patients.

Obstetric fistula is an internal injury caused by an unrelieved obstructed labour during childbirth. It leaves a woman incontinent, humiliated and grieving the loss of her child.

“We knew she was more in need than any of the others. And so, we saw the first of many fistula patients,” wife Catherine once said of witnessing the horror.

That was the moment the Hamlin’s knew they wanted to change the story, and more than 60 years later, their life’s work combatting Obstetric fistula is being celebrated and remembered in a region Reg once called home.

While both doctors have since passed, their spirit lives on through various fundraising branches throughout NZ that continue to support the work going on in Ethiopia.

An awareness tour of New Zealand titled “The Hospital By the River” hopes to shed light on this work. Its stops include Auckland, Wellington, and Hawke’s Bay.

During the foundation’s initial years, Reg and Catherine knew that things weren’t right in Ethiopia.

Working through military unrest, famine, and civil war, the Hamlin’s sought to dramatically transform the maternal healthcare landscape in the country they called home.

Initially working from the Princess Tsehai Memorial Hospital in Addis Ababa, Catherine and Reg refined the surgical technique for repairing obstetric fistula injuries while continuing to treat a broad range of obstetric cases.

Within the first three years, they had operated on 300 fistula patients. As news of a cure spread, more patients arrived, and the pair eventually fundraised enough to open the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital in 1974.

Reg Hamlin worked at the hospital until he died in 1993. After Reg’s death, Catherine refused to leave. She stayed on and developed a complete treatment for women suffering from a fistula.

She and her team went on to open five more Hamlin regional fistula hospitals, a rehabilitation and reintegration centre, and a college training midwives to prevent fistula injuries from occurring in the first place.

Catherine lived on the grounds of Hamlin’s Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital until she passed away peacefully at her home there in March 2020.

Next week, in Havelock, North Hamlin Fistula NZ chairwoman Joli Wescombe, who has spent time in Ethiopia, will speak on her experiences and the work being done there.

“I, like many New Zealanders, have a personal connection with the devastation of a maternal death. Two of my great-grandmothers died in childbirth, leaving behind a generation of trauma,” she said.

“I remember seeing my grandmother crying in her 80s, recalling the worry and burden of having to step in and raise her six younger siblings at age 14 when her mother died.

“As a New Zealand midwife, I know we are fortunate to have access to quality midwifery and maternity care. However, in developing nations, pregnancy is not just a cause for joy, but also a time of real danger for mother and baby.”

She said she was first taken by the Hamlins’ core values of compassion and always treating women with dignity and respect.

“Each woman is treated holistically so that they can reintegrate into their community with confidence and a bright future ahead.”

Jayne Rattray, fundraising manager for Hamlin Fistula New Zealand, said Reg and Catherine had set the Hamlin Foundation up so that it could continue long after they were gone.

“It was their legacy. They set up fundraising offices so they could continue the fundraising and continue the work happening in Ethiopia, which has grown and expanded since they both passed,” Rattray said.

Hamlin Fistula Ethiopia’s governance and team are 100% Ethiopian. Almost 600 Ethiopian professionals - many of whom were trained by Catherine - work across the organisation to deliver the Hamlin Model of Care for women with fistula injuries.

“I think about 60,000 women were treated during the couple’s lifetime, and we are up to about 70,000 now. Nothing really has changed, and everything they wanted to achieve had been set in stone so it could be passed on for generations to come.”

The Hospital By the River talk is free to attend and will be held at St Luke’s Anglican Church, Havelock North, on Wednesday, August 21, from 2pm to 3.30pm.

Mitchell Hageman joined Hawke’s Bay Today in January 2023. From his Napier base, he writes regularly on social issues, arts and culture, and the community. He has a particular love for stories about ordinary people doing extraordinary things.