Bali bombing 15 years on: Josh Deegan’s legacy lives on in world-leading Royal Adelaide Hospital burns unit

A FOUNDATION set up in the name of Bali bombing victim Josh Deegan has led to an Adelaide burns unit being known as the best in the world — 15 years after the tragedy.

Tanja Klotz, Brad Schmitt, Stuart Harper and Professor John Greenwood from the new Royal Adelaide Hospital Burns Unit with Lee Kelly and Patrick Deegan from the Josh Deegan Foundation. Picture: AAP/Mark Brake

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IN THE vast expanses of the sprawling new Royal Adelaide Hospital, the Adult Burns Unit occupies only a small corner of the north wing’s seventh floor.

But Professor John Greenwood, the unit’s director, says it is home to a world-leading — and far-reaching — service.

And he has no hesitation in declaring who and what deserves a portion of the credit.

“We are — and I do not think there is any doubt about saying this — the best burns service in the world,” Dr Greenwood says.

“And it is in large part due, certainly in most of our projects that we run, down to the work of the Josh Deegan Foundation.

“They set it up to honour a friend and brother … and it has become fundamental to what we do.”

That friend and brother was Josh Deegan, the Sturt footballer who was among 88 Australians killed in a terrorist attack at a nightclub in Bali on October 12, 2002.

Sturt footballer Josh Deegan.

On the eve of the 15th anniversary of the Bali bombings, the Eastern Courier Messenger spoke with the family members, friends, doctors and nurses who have used the atrocity to help improve treatment and support for burns patients in SA.

From its origins as a hastily-arranged golf day, the Josh Deegan Foundation has raised more than $200,000 to help Dr Greenwood’s team buy specialised equipment and train dozens of rural nurses and therapists.

“It is a little bit overwhelming to be honest,” says Patrick Deegan, Josh’s youngest brother and one of the foundation’s directors.

“I did not think that we could get to a point where we could go from (supporting) pre-burns, post-burns and recovery.”

Mr Deegan was 11 years old when two bombs were detonated at Kuta’s Sari Club, killing 202 people and injuring 209 others.

His brother was among a group of Sturt Football Cub members at the Bali nightspot celebrating a SANFL Grand Final win a few weeks earlier.

Double Blues trainer Bob Marshall also died in the blast, while veteran player Julian Burton — who would later partner with Dr Greenwood to raise millions of dollars for burns-related causes around Australia — was among those badly injured.

“It was obviously a real shock at the time,” Mr Deegan says of news of his brother’s death.

In the months after the tragedy, Mr Deegan, his older brother Nick and Josh’s best mate, Lee Kelly, met up frequently to play golf at Belair Golf Course.

It led to the first Josh Deegan Golf Day in 2003.

“The intention was purely to honour Josh and getting friends and family together to do something that he loved,” says Mr Kelly, who is also one of the foundation’s directors.

“The first time we had about 100 people and it was not really organised — it was just go out and have a hit.”

Sturt trainer Bob Marshall.

With the blessing of Josh’s father, barrister Brian Deegan, Mr Kelly donated money from the event to the Royal Adelaide Hospital’s burns unit.

The size of the donations increased as the annual golf day rose in popularity — as many as 36 teams teed-off one year.

Its growth led to the creation of the Josh Deegan Foundation in March 2014.

Dr Greenwood says money from the golf day initially helped pay for hospital equipment.

But the foundation has later played a more essential role in funding specialised burns training for nurses and therapists in country SA and the Northern Territory.

The burns unit’s nursing co-ordinator, Stuart Harper, says the Burns Link Program means rural patients do not have to travel to Adelaide for appointments, saving them time, money and emotional energy.

“We may never actually physically see that person … but they get the same level of treatment as if they came from a metropolitan area,” Mr Harper says.

The foundation this year paid for a group of rural nurses to attend a burns conference in Western Australia, and is in discussions with the unit to establish a peer-support program for victims.

Brian Deegan at a church service to mark the 10th anniversary of the bombings in 2012.

But despite its growth, Mr Kelly has no plans to expand the foundation, which is run by a small group of family and friends on an entirely volunteer basis.

He says that is due, in large part, to the deeply personal nature of the cause as well as to ensure “every cent” raised is donated to the burns unit.

For Dr Greenwood — who each year makes a speech at the Josh Deegan Golf Day — the foundation’s contribution has been a powerful and positive legacy of the horror of Bali.

“The Bali experience opened up everybody’s eyes to the horror of burn injury,” he says.

“If it had not been for that horrible trauma and dreadful loss, burns would always have been a subset of other problems that do deserve to have charitable funding.

“They have been absolutely selfless in setting up the foundation.”