Women suffering on Australia's doorstep By Daniel Flitton in Melbourne Aoife Ni Mhurchu treats a patient for knife cuts from her husband.
In the early evening on Friday, a woman arrived at hospital, bloody stumps instead of fingers on her right hand, her left hand all but severed. 
"Chop wounds" is the medical term used by the doctors and nurses in remote Papua New Guinea - and for this woman they were the consequence of her father attacking her with a machete.
"We still don't know if we've succeeded in saving her hand," said Aoife Ni Mhurchu, an Irish nurse who was called in to help for the two-hour emergency surgery after the woman arrived at the Tari hospital in the southern highlands region.
A recent report estimates that almost two-thirds of local women suffer physical or sexual violence in their lifetime. "This is not an isolated crime at all," said Ms Ni Mhurchu. "It's very common."
Medecins Sans Frontieres, the medical charity that supports the Family Support Centre linked to the hospital in Tari, released a graphic report on Tuesday showing victims and their children regularly suffer from a pattern of violence, with few chances for formal help.
The hospital in Tari and another facility supported by the charity in PNG's capital, Port Moresby, have treated more than 1460 women beaten by their partners in the past two years, with one in five suffering major injuries.
"A variety of weapons, including sticks, knives, machetes, whips and blunt objects were used to inflict these injuries," the report said.
Ms Ni Mhurchu said the 28-year-old woman brought by her sister to Tari hospital on Friday had fled her abusive husband through the bush, back to her home village with her two young children.
But the woman's father was enraged, shouting he could not feed three extra mouths or afford to repay the "bride price" to her husband. He then hacked her with what is known as a bush knife.
A "bride price" in the patriarchal society is paid by one village to another in exchange for marriage, and Ms Ni Mhurchu said it was often a substantial sum, on average 15,000 kina ($6900) and four pigs, highly prized in rural PNG.
"The situation is that she will now most likely have to return to her abusive husband with these horrific injuries," Ms Ni Mhurchu said.
Five of the six safe houses set up for women to escape family violence are in the capital.
The report said PNG health authorities had taken significant steps to address family violence, which includes 2013 laws for family protection. But Ms Ni Mhurchu said there was still little enforcement and called on Australia and other international aid donors to help.
"It is a matter of urgency and it shouldn't be tolerated or ignored any longer."