Now in Kathmandu with Samaritan's Purse, his team has set up inside Anandaban Hospital, a former leprosy hospital, helping its two surgeons fix broken bones and other earthquake-related injuries.
"There are two Nepali surgeons who have been working flat out here, and there's been a need for metal implants used for the broken limbs and so on of the patients that are coming through," he said.
"Our team, we've got one orthopaedic surgeon here and there's myself an anaesthetist, who're just supporting these guys in surgery here."
The hospital was now "flush with people" from medical and aid teams and was "able to handle" the crowds coming in, he said.
"The bulk of the main medical overall needs are being met, and they're also being met by local doctors."
The hospital had luckily been "spared" from any serious damage in the tremor, but it lost a wall in the staff quarters and cracks had appeared in the guest houses. The operating theatre was fine, the hospital had its own generator and a stash of fuel, as well as a secure water supply, he said.
Anandaban Hospital was also offering free medical care, and doctors had urged locals to visit remote villages in the surrounding hilltops and bring back anyone who seriously injured. Even offering compensation for fuel.
"We're actively trying to repatriate patients that are too worried about going to the Kathmandu Valley for their procedure because it's going to cost them some more [money]," Dr Lee said.
Many of these patients were holding off seeking medical attention because their injuries weren't critical, he said.
"The problem is a lot of the critically injured patients have all been airlifted out, what remains is this middle group, who have got injuries enough to stop them from working, some cuts and wounds, but have lost their homes," he said.
Many were trying to tend to their crops before the monsoon rains started, he said, but they also had to repair their homes.
"Having to do those two things at once is going to be hard, really hard. And that's where the heartache is really."
The biggest issue facing the Nepalese was food and shelter, he said. Doctors at the hospital reported hungry patients, as many cannot afford to buy food after their supplies and money were buried in the rubble of their quake-demolished homes.
On a visit to one of the mountain-top villages in the Gokha region close to the epicentre, Mr Lee said his team was approached by people asking for food the moment they stepped off the helicopter.
It was easy for medical professionals like himself to come in quickly after a disaster and get to work on the "sexy, dramatic" stuff, he said, but it was the long-term aid and relief that the locals really needed.
"If you get these impoverished people not having their basic needs met while all the focus is on the urgent stuff, boy, that's not going to be good down the track, it really isn't," Dr Lee said.
"Look at the long-term thing rather than jumping in with everybody looking at the acute emergency stuff. Here I am as an anaesthetist, and I can move fast and get into places to provide acute surgical services immediately to alleviate suffering, but my heart is actually really on long-term development and getting people sheltered, safe and fed."
He said: "There's 8 million people who won't have a home for the next few months, and the monsoon's coming, and that's when the danger is going to come.
"When the monsoon hits, the roads are going to be closed from landslides, and they're not going to get help at all. That's the despairing thing about working out here."
There was a little hope on the horizon, however, as people were beginning to move back inside buildings which were left deserted in the days after the quake for fear they would collapse in an aftershock. Dr Lee and his team, as well as many other aid teams, were sleeping in tents or under gazebos.
"A lot of the people have been sleeping in tents, but people have moved in in the last two days," he said. "We have noticed shops have all opened now, the roads are filled with cars again."
The aftershocks were still happening and were "still frightening a lot of people".
• Donate to International Nepal Fellowship.
• Donate to Samaritan's Purse
