Real life FROM PENNILESS PRISONER Orthopaedic surgeon Dr Munjed Al Muderis is a maverick, performing a radical procedure to restore TO BIONIC the limbs of amputees. SURGEON He’s a miracle worker who fits amputees with radical robotic limbs. Yet just how did he escape of hydraulics, sensors and a lithium battery drive the lower limb – allows his life in war-torn Iraq to become a Porsche- patients almost the same range of motion driving Sydney surgeon? Clair Weaver reports. and movement as an able-bodied person. Because the leg is connected to the skeleton, patients often remark they can “feel the ground” under their artificial E’S A WORLD- than the clothes on his back. He had fled foot for the first time. It bears little leading surgeon his native Iraq when Saddam Hussein’s resemblance to traditional prosthetics, who drives a henchmen ordered him to carry out the which can be painful and cumbersome. Porsche, wears most brutal of acts: cutting the ears off “They go from being a disabled person Italian designer soldiers who had deserted. Transferred to someone who is special – with something clothes and to a violence-wracked detention centre extra,” Dr Al Muderis says. “We’re on lives in a luxury in the WA outback, Dr Al Muderis was the verge of changing the future for waterfront home known for the next 10 months only by amputee management worldwide.” overlooking the Sydney Harbour Bridge. his number: “982”. Over the past three years, he has ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ PatientsH come from all over the world to performed more of this type of surgery than CONTENT AVAILABLE FROM OCTOBER 24, 2013 TO DECEMBER 22, 2013. go under his knife, as he transforms lives TODAY, HIS NAME has global reach. anyone else, pushing into world-first with artificial bones and robotic limbs. He’s one of only a handful of orthopaedic territory with the complexity of his cases. VIEWA He leads research, lectures and travels surgeons in the world performing The British military is sending a double- regularly to Europe to stay on top of his osseointegration: a radical procedure amputee halfway around the world to game. Confident, driven and articulate, in which a metallic rod is implanted his clinic as a trial, with a view to referring Dr Munjed Al Muderis has all the directly into an amputee’s thigh bone, fighters who have lost legs in combat. “I’m trappings of Australia’s medical elite. creating a protruding artificial bone very honoured,” Dr Al Muderis says. WATCH A BIONIC LEG IN ACTION Yet, 14 years ago, it was a very that connects directly onto a robotic While there’s irony in an Iraqi-born To see one of Dr Al Muderis’ different picture. Soaking wet and limb. The resulting bionic leg – in surgeon rehabilitating troops from nations patients demonstrating his bionic leg, download the free viewa app exhausted, he was hauled ashore by which bone and muscle grow around that occupied his country, the 41-year-old (see Contents) and scan this page police as a refugee, with little more the upper part of the rod and a system feels a strong desire to give back. ➤ PHOTOGRAPHY BY TIM BAUER. STYLING STAV HORTIS. GROOMING AND HAIR MAKE-UP NISHA VAN BERKEL. THESE IMAGES HAVE BEEN RETOUCHED. with your smartphone or tablet. 34 AWW.COM.AU NOVEMBER 2013 NOVEMBER 2013 AWW.COM.AU 35 Schwarzenegger movie, The Terminator, Dr Al Muderis at home as a teen that captured his imagination. with his daughter, “I knew then I wanted to become a Sophia, four, who is as enthralled by videos surgeon,” he recalls. “The ultimate dream of her dad’s surgery as was to make a half-human, half-robot.” playing with her Barbie ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ dolls. Opposite: Dr Al ALTHOUGH FORCED TO build a new Muderis as a child life from scratch, Dr Al Muderis comes (left) and (right) his parents in Iraq. from a privileged background in Iraq. A descendant of Iraqi royalty, his uncle was an ex-prime minister and his late father, Abdul Razzak Al Muderis, was head of the country’s Supreme Court. Yet medicine was also in his blood. After graduating from university, he was working as an intern at Baghdad Hospital when the brutality of Saddam Hussein’s regime pierced the comfortable “[Losing a limb] is an unfortunate bubble of his everyday life. He had thing to happen to anyone,” he says, “but “I knew then I wanted been mulling over plans for dinner especially soldiers who are trying to help to become a surgeon. when three busloads of soldiers suddenly out in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.” pulled up outside. “[Military commanders] His sense of obligation doesn’t end there: The ultimate dream was came in and ordered us to surgically Dr Al Muderis is also a squadron leader remove the ears of about 100 army in the Australian Air Force Reserves and to make a half-human, deserters,” he recalls. hopes his surgical skills can be used in half-robot.” The head of his department challenged service to this country’s injured defence the order, citing the universal medical personnel – “it’s the reason I joined.” pledge “to do no harm”. ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ robotic surgery. In 2008, he obtained “So the commanders gathered everyone SO HOW DID this one-time boat his surgical fellowship in orthopaedics, in the carpark and put a bullet through person get to where he is today? At before travelling to Germany to learn his head. Then they said, ‘If you share his Curtin Detention Centre in WA’s the osseointegration procedure. views, please come forward.’” In horror, Kimberley, he met then Immigration During a stint in NSW’s Lismore, he met Dr Al Muderis hid in a female toilet Minister Philip Ruddock during an a beautiful Russian medical trainee, Irina, cubicle for five hours. Heart pounding official inspection of the facility. now his 36-year-old wife and a GP. The as soldiers stalked the corridors in “We were having a conversation and couple has a four-year-old daughter, search of missing doctors, he made I said that I was a doctor,” recalls Dr Al Sophia, along with his sons, Adam, 11, and a run for it during a lull. Sprinting into Muderis. “He said, ‘You will probably Dean, nine, from a previous relationship. the outer suburbs, he knew he could never prove your qualification [in The boys are following in their father’s never go home again. Australia]’.” Yet this was no deterrent. footsteps by excelling at school, while ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ “If you want something and you are their younger sister is as equally enraptured HIS FEARS WERE warranted: intelligence determined, anything is possible. Australia by videos of her dad’s surgery as playing officers came looking for him, questioning is the land of opportunity,” he says. with her beloved Barbie dolls. his mother as he fled by bus to Jordan. So what would he say if he were Even with increasing commitments In the capital, Amman, the young doctor reunited with Mr Ruddock today? “I’d elsewhere in his life, Dr Al Muderis’ contacted an aunt, who helped him get to be interested to meet him – his opinions capacity for work shows no sign of Malaysia, via Abu Dhabi. still carry weight,” muses Dr Al Muderis. abating. It’s not uncommon for him Here his destiny fell into the laps of “Not to say, ‘You’re wrong’, but to say, to be operating from early morning to people smugglers. In Kuala Lumpur, he ‘Hey mate, let’s talk about it.’” midnight during the week, fuelled by met a blond man who demanded $1500 ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ up to two litres of Coca-Cola a day. upfront to get him to Indonesia. Handing ONE OF THE reasons behind his meteoric Most surgeons have one daily theatre over the money, Dr Al Muderis asked, rise is his extraordinary work ethic. Since list; he often has two on the go. “How can I trust you?” The response: his release, he has accepted placements It’s clear his job is far more than a way “What choice do you have?” from Mildura and Melbourne to Bendigo, to pay the bills. A curious child, he loved In Jakarta, he was fast-tracked onto Wollongong and Canberra – while never to construct things with his Meccano set. a boat when it was discovered he was a giving up on his dream of undertaking Yet it was seeing the blockbuster Arnold doctor. Until Dr Al Muderis stepped ➤ THIS PAGE: PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF DR AL MUDERIS. OPPOSITE: PHOTOGRAPHY BY TIM BAUER. OPPOSITE: ARTWORK BY ISMAIL FATTAH AL TURK. 36 AWW.COM.AU NOVEMBER 2013 NOVEMBER 2013 AWW.COM.AU 37 like to be treated like a number – the secret to his bedside manner is simple. “I treat them as human beings.” ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ ✽ AS THE WEEKLY went to print, asylum seeker policy was a headline issue. Prime Minister Tony Abbott had begun a regime of “turning back the boats” – along with limited refugee visas, tighter border patrols and offshore processing. The death toll from another asylum boat tragedy, Dr Al Muderis with meanwhile, was mounting. his wife, Irina, a To Dr Al Muderis, who understands GP, and their the issue more comprehensively than daughter, Sophia. most, neither of the major political parties has provided a real solution. onto the flimsy wooden vessel – soon to “Even today, I don’t like He points out that there is no “queue” be crammed with about 160 passengers and little choice in the chaotic world of rather than the 50 he’d been advised of the colour green, it puts refugees.