In the span of about a week, Dr. Julien Auger has gone from treating his patients at a hospital north of Montreal to caring for some of the tens of thousands of refugees who are fleeing bombings in their home cities in Ukraine.
The 35-year-old father of two left his family in Saint-Jerôme, Que. to join the humanitarian effort along the border with Poland where upwards of 100,000 Ukrainian refugees are crossing every day.
In the small Polish village of Hrebenne, where Auger is now, he's seeing some people arrive with second-degree burns to their bodies and many are severely dehydrated from their sometimes harrowing journeys.
"Some of them … they saw things in their city, they saw bombings in the neighbouring cities," Auger told CTV News in an interview Wednesday afternoon.
"So they say it's a pretty tough way to go from Ukraine to Poland. Just at the border, it's a 14-hour wait in buses that are completely full with people. So people, they arrive in Poland, they're pretty stressed, they're pretty tired. And so that's their situation. When I see them, they have most of them with children."
His initial plan was to treat the wounded in Ukraine, but soon after arriving in Europe he realized it was no longer safe to do so.
News reports of Russian attacks on hospitals and civilians getting killed from shelling in residential neighbourhoods influenced his decision to not enter the country.
On Wednesday, Ukrainian officials said a Russian strike hit a children's hospital and maternity facility in the besieged southeastern port city of Mariupol, causing "colossal" damage and leaving children under the wreckage.
Because of the hostile situation on the ground, Auger instead decided to lend his efforts along the Ukraine-Poland border, where more than one million refugees have crossed since the Russian invasion started, according to the United Nations.
He found a role to provide medical care at the Hrebenne refugee camp, doing anything he can to help people in need.
"Right now, a lot of refugees are crossing the border in really tough conditions. So people are arriving, dehydrated, they haven't eaten in a while," he said.
"Those who have chronic conditions, they don't necessarily have their medication for them."
The day before he arrived, he said, a man in his 50s showed up at the refugee camp, had a seizure and suffered a cardiac arrest. Doctors there were not able to save him.
Some of the younger refugees who have the means are renting hostel rooms across the border on their way to Berlin and other European cities.
Auger said he's run into a few at the same hostel were he's staying, but others who are less fortunate are staying in the camps until they find the means to go elsewhere.
He said he was struck by the generosity of other Europeans and "their will to help" by offering to drive or host Ukrainians who have been displaced by the war. Some, he said, show up at the border offering rides in their minivans to Warsaw or Krakow.
Auger said a fellow volunteer at the refugee camp, a Portuguese national, helped a displaced Ukrainian find accommodation by connecting them with some friends in Portugal.
European Union countries are stepping up their efforts to help the people of Ukraine as more and more citizens are fleeing the country.
As of Wednesday, the UN said more than two million people have fled Ukraine, calling it the fastest-growing refugee crisis in Europe since the Second World War.
In the early days of the invasion, two weeks ago, Auger struggled to see the destruction unfold on the internet and in news coverage, he said, because he was watching the crisis "at home in my comfort."
"I was listening to BBC reports in my car and I was crying in my car. It's really something that was affecting me on a personal level," he said.
"And when I took my decision to come here, and being here, I feel at least I'm here with them. I'm supporting them as much as I can."
It's been six days since he said goodbye to his wife and children, aged three and five, with whom he is keeping in touch when he can. His wife is making a sacrifice by working and taking care of their kids alone, but she's doing it with a lot of support back home, he said.
"It's hard for me not seeing my children," he said, "but I think right now the Ukrainian people are going through really rough times and what I'm going through, it's nothing compared to what they have to endure."
