More than 20 years after two doctors fought to save her life, Dr Jana Campbell walked the graduation stage as a newly qualified medical doctor. Her life story came full circle on Friday when she obtained her MBChB degree at the December graduation ceremony of the University of the Free State’s (UFS) faculty of health sciences. As a baby, Campbell was treated by Prof Stephen Brown, head of the division of paediatric cardiology, and Prof David Griesel, an associate professor in the department of paediatrics and child health at UFS.
On Friday, she graduated from the same institution where they teach now. Born prematurely in January 2002, Campbell had severely underdeveloped lungs and a heart condition that left doctors unsure she would survive. After medical staff in Vryburg, North West, could do no more, she was taken to Universitas Academic Hospital in Bloemfontein.
There, Brown, a paediatric heart specialist and long-time friend of her father, became the first specialist to intervene. She underwent emergency surgery and was admitted to the intensive care unit, where Brown and Griesel, a neurodevelopmental subspecialist, closely monitored her condition. Years later, she met them again, this time not as a patient but as a medical student.
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This experience was incredible. Going through it with my friends made it magical. We carried each other, we grew together, and now we start our next chapter together “As a child, my parents told me the story of how I got the mark on my chest,” she said.
“To later sit in a classroom and learn from the doctors who saved my life was surreal. You grow up hearing about these incredible people who gave you a chance at life, and one day they are teaching you how to save others. “Prof Brown recognised me immediately because of his friendship with my father.
With Prof Griesel, I introduced myself after a lecture, and he remembered me at once,” she said. “It was emotional. These were the people who made my life possible, and now they were part of shaping the doctor I want to become.” Campbell believes her difficult start in life played a role in guiding her towards a career in medicine.
“What they showed me was the power of showing up for people. Their actions didn’t just change my life — they created my future. Medicine became my way of passing that gift forward.“ Her graduation was made more special in that she completed her degree alongside four close school friends from C&N Sekondêre Meisieskool Oranje: Drs Bea Louw, Carli Olivier, Ivanke van Jaarsveld and Katia Geustyn. Except for Louw, who will begin her internship at 2 Military Hospital in Cape Town, the group will continue their internships together at Pelonomi Hospital in Bloemfontein.
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