MEHWISH RIAZ
Mehwish Riaz, 24, psychiatric nurse and charity worker.

As a psychiatric nurse and charity worker Mehwish Riaz helped to establish a health centre and a centre for alternative remedies in rural Zambia. Living in basic conditions, Mehwish contributed to teaching primary health care, sexual health care and wound management, as well as testing for diseases in a community of over 40 different villages.

Following the devastation of the Tsunami disaster Mehwish took one month unpaid leave to volunteer in the Tamil occupied East Coast of Sri Lanka. Her duties included working in a mobile pharmacy offering baby and toddler health care, assistance in trauma surgery and wound and injury management.

After the devastating earthquake in Pakistan, Mehwish and a team of doctors, nurses and other volunteers led by her father travelled to Pakistan to the more isolated villages to provide medical care. Mehwish was responsible for managing a pharmacy, triaging patients, assisting in intubating, anaesthetising and basic bone manipulation, as well as providing after care for orthopaedic patients and running a female outpatients clinic.

Now working with her father, Mehwish is working towards raising money and setting up a charity for the Pakistan earthquake relief fund. They will be travelling back to Pakistan later in the year to help build a multipurpose centre for amputees and new houses for those left homeless by the disaster.

Top