3 December 2024

A medical student at Wimmera Base Hospital has committed to volunteering at a mission in Uganda this December.

Wesley Plange is in the third year of medical studies with Deakin University and has been on placement at Horsham as part of a 12-month training program that includes working in Emergency, Anaesthetics, Surgery and General Medicine.

He will be in a team of 15 registrars, interns and medical students travelling from Australia, as part of the Mission Mannya program to service the remote region of Rakai in South Uganda.

Wesley said he was alerted to the program by a colleague who works as a registrar at Alfred Hospital.

“He and some of my seniors from Deakin travel over each year to volunteer and I decided I want to be a part of that as well,” Wesley said.

“I spent my formative years in Ballarat and Stawell but I have roots in Ghana. I have travelled to Africa, Asia and the Pacific and this has particularly spurred my interest in public health.

“I’ve experienced rural communities but I have also seen the third world health setting as well and that has all inspired my pursuit to help. I’ve got a big interest in public health promotion and serving rural and regional communities."

Wesley said his role was to help spread the word and ask for donations to pay for medical supplies for Mission Mannya.

“We all self-fund our own trips so the donations are purely for the medical supplies to service the community. We’ll be there for about two weeks and we hope to service about 2000 people in that time.

“We would primarily be treating infectious diseases like we get here but we will be prepared for a variety of treatments.”

To make an online donation for medical supplies, go to Wes's fundraising for Mission Mannya 2024