Pacific

Team of US urologists arrives in Marshall Islands

15:04 pm on 24 March 2014

A team of American nurses and doctors is expecting to attend to a huge turnout of patients on its current mission to the Marshall Islands.

From today the group of urologists from Canvasback Missions will treat residents for nine days from its base at Majuro hospital.

On its last mission it treated 500 patients in five days and found five cases of advanced cervical cancer in a week.

Our correspondent in the Marshall Islands, Giff Johnson, it's great having the medical team visit, but it illustrates the holes in the country's health system.

"The challenge in the Marshall Islands is getting early diagnosis. The challenge for the Ministry of Health right now is the hospital is short staffed on physicians and has been short staffed for quite some time."

Giff Johnson says the doctors won't be anticipating to find further tumors on this trip, but will be expecting a huge turnout.