By Owen Sexton / owen@chronline.com

While the war in Ukraine rages into its second year and becomes increasingly politicized in the United States, Dr. Patrick Jung, who grew up in Oakville, has returned from spending three months volunteering at a hotel in Poland to provide primary medical care to Ukrainian refugees fleeing the Russian invasion.

The 39-year-old Washington native said politics played no part in his decision to volunteer.

There are people that are suffering due to circumstances they cant control and those people have openly asked the world for help, Jung said.

He said he felt a connection to the Ukrainians he met while in Poland.

I think the Ukrainian people share our values and they want the same things we want. They want to be left alone. They want peace. They want freedom. And most of all, they want the opportunity to try to create better lives for their families, Jung told The Chronicle.

He found out about the volunteer opportunity through a social media post where he connected with a retired emergency room doctor from Massachusetts by the name of Dr. Brian Lisse, who got him into contact with the Pastoral Family Care Foundation in Przemyl, Poland.

The Pastoral Family Care Foundation is a Catholic volunteer organization under the Archdiocese of Przemyl with several sites in Poland that provide refugees with housing, food, medical and social services. Additionally, the foundation helps refugees get in contact with other Polish or international organizations to continue providing aid.

When the war started, one person in particular, Father Marek (Machaa), started to raise funds and find facilities and it went from basically housing a few families on site to having multiple sites throughout southeast Poland, Jung said.

Using an old hotel in Zatwarnica, the Pastoral Family Care Foundation set up a space where Ukrainian refugees can get some respite. Around 100 refugees called that particular hotel home while Jung was there.

While at the hotel, refugees either wait for the conflict in their country to end so they can return or move on to another country such as France, Germany or Italy seeking refuge.

Volunteer doctors are needed in the area right now as the nearest hospital to the hotel in Zatwarnica is about two hours away and it's even further for any other kind of medical specialists.

While Jung specializes in psychiatric medicine, he was the main primary care doctor during his time there. Though he did spend a lot of time diagnosing and treating common medical issues such as colds or earaches, people with chronic illnesses and injuries were also seen. Routine exams and checkups were also performed.

As you can imagine there were a fair amount of mental health concerns as well in that population, Jung said.

Despite being isolated in the mountains in southeast Poland, supplies were plentiful thanks to support from the Polish Red Cross and other volunteer organizations giving not just medical supplies but food, clothing and school supplies.

Children staying at the refugee hotel have the option of attending either Polish or Ukrainian school. Jung said kids often attend both.

In the evenings, we had activities organized for the kids, including arts and crafts, singing or sometimes just sledding and playing in the snow. Local volunteer teachers, musicians and many others came regularly to give their time and try to restore some normalcy to the situation that these families were facing, Jung said.

Jungs wife, Rhea, also joined him on the trip as she teaches language and volunteered her time helping with the childrens classes. And while they were both there to help the refugees, those refugees werent just sitting around.

Most of the adults would volunteer in some form or another, from cooking to gathering firewood for the hotels central furnace.

I dont speak Polish or Ukrainian. One of the ladies that came over as a refugee, she was an English teacher in Ukraine and very quickly picked up Polish and kind of became our volunteer medical-assistant-slash-interpreter, Jung said. She had been doing that ever since last April. She was wonderful.

The assistant, who went by the name of Liliia, would also help fellow refugees navigate Polish social service systems.

U.S. volunteers arent alone as Jung also saw volunteers from Italy, Germany and France during his time there.

He added the experience was unlike any other in his life, and while he still has love for his hometown, he felt that leaving Oakville was what led to him getting this volunteer opportunity.

Going to school (in Oakville), I loved it. Its a small town. You know everybody. Its a really safe place to grow up, but it does feel like your opportunities are limited, Jung said.

After graduating and leaving Oakville to work for a while, he then went to medical school in the Caribbean at the Saba University School of Medicine.

Once Jung graduated, he returned to Washington briefly and interned practicing family medicine in Puyallup for a year before moving on to focus on psychiatry at the University of Maryland Medical Center where he has been for the last three years now.

And while many refugees are finding shelter at places like the hotel in Zatwarnica, Jung said there are many with disabilities, and others who simply lack the means to leave, still trapped in Ukraine.

Some volunteers he worked with are still in Europe and are now helping others escape Ukraine.

Additionally, the Pastoral Family Care Foundation is still in need of more volunteer doctors and donations.

Those interested in donating or volunteering can visit Pastoral Family Care Foundations website at https://pfcf.pl/en/home-en/ or contact Lisse at brianlisse2@gmail.com for more information.

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Doctor From Oakville Volunteers in Poland Providing Aid to ... - Centralia Chronicle