Child Protection Nicaragua Project #8657

Healing Children's Hearts in Nicaragua

by Surgeons of Hope Foundation, Inc.

Project Report | Jun 3, 2013
New Heart Center to Open this Month

By Leila Hawken | Executive Assistant

Collaborative Team Gathers

June will bring tremendous progress to Surgeons of Hope's program in Nicaragua with the opening of the new Pediatric Heart Center, adjacent to La Mascota Children's Hospital in Managua. The Health Ministry of Nicaragua is equally excited about this first opening, which will be a phased-in program, featuring the opening of one of the two operating rooms, and half of the ICU unit furnished. The formal Grand Opening is scheduled for 2014, but this opening will be celebrated as the first surgical mission team will gather in late June, coming from France, Palestine, and Colombia, to perform the first surgeries in the new facility. The team of ten is looking forward to their historic role in providing access to pediatric open-heart surgery for the poor in Nicaragua.

Surgeons of Hope has been working hard to provide furnishings for the new Center. A new operating room table is on its way from Germany, and operating room lights are being sent as a donation from a hospital in Delaware. Two huge shipping containers full of ICU beds and regular hospital beds, monitoring equipment and supplies have arrived safely in Managua from New York (AFYA) and Denver (Project CURE). They have cleared Customs, and are awaiting trucking from the Health Ministry warehouse to the new Heart Center. Philippe Lerch, our SoH Regional Director for the Nicaragua Program, is in Managua to oversee the furnishing of the new Center, and he is eagerly awaiting the arrival of the trucks bearing the new equipment and supplies.

While the donations of supplies and equipment have been on-going, Surgeons of Hope still needs you, our GlobalGiving family. Your faithfulness to our efforts is a great joy to us, as your donations will provide for the necessities that accompany this equipping effort. The local staff at La Mascota is earnest in welcoming the improvements to their pediatric care capabilities, but there are real challenges that remain. While they wish to be able to do a better job with sterilization, for example, they are hampered by lack of the supplies that are necessary to achieve that progress. Everything from pump dispensers for hand soap and right up the supply ladder is sorely needed. That's where our GlobalGiving team comes in.

Please consider doing what you can to help and if you are a past donor, please give again.

Existing Anesthesia Conditions

New Operating Room Ready for Equipment

Team Prepares to Unpack Surgical Supplies

Links:

Want to know more? See our website.

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Mar 22, 2013
Mt Sinai Medical Center Completes Surgical Mission

By Leila Hawken | Executive Assistant, Surgeons of Hope Foundation

Operation in progress

A 19-member surgical/medical team from Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York has returned from an SoH sponsored week-long mission trip to La Mascota Children's Hospital in Managua, the site of SoH's new Pediatric Heart Center of Nicaragua. Reports are in from the doctors who treated the nine waiting infants and children. During the week, one of the little infants expired from being too weak to recover from the complex surgery, underscoring the urgency of opening the new Heart Center and the planned satellite clinics which will speed the care to the population.

The new Heart Center is completed now, and the next three phases will see the equipment and furnishings being installed. Phase One will open one operating room and two ICU beds in June of this year (2013), and we will be sponsoring a mission from NY Presbyterian Hospital to visit for the week and celebrate the opening with a week of surgeries and on-going training of the local staff.

Two full containers of purchased and donated medical equipment and supplies are being shipped this month (March) to arrive in time for the opening. One container will go from Denver (Project CURE) and the other from New York. The containers include hospital beds, ICU beds, monitors, surgical insruments appropriately sized for infants and children, perfusion equipment, echocardiography equipment, and more. Also being shipped is a Smartboard unit, a gift from Ronald McDonald House Charities, to be put to great use in training and telemedicine programs we are initiating as part of our program. Needless to say, the local hospital staff are excited to be seeing their new Pediatric Heart Center take shape.

Thanks to our Global Giving donors our program is proceeding apace. Much needs to be done in preparation for the opening. We continue to need the help of our family of Global Giving Donors. Why not distribute this report to family and friends who might be willing to join with you in supporting Surgeons of Hope? Small donations add up.

Part of the team gathers for photo

Mother Providing a Drink of Water

Little One Preparing for Surgery

Links:

Check out our website for more info

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Jan 3, 2013
International Team Completes Mission

By Leila Hawken | Executive Assistant, Surgeons of Hope

Final Stage of Construction

Progress on our project in Nicaragua has two successes to report. The new Pediatric Heart Center of Nicaragua is virtually completed now, with inside walls being painted in December, 2012. The coming months will see the acquisition and installation of modern hospital equipment to bring one of the two operating rooms and half of the facility to a ready-for-occupancy status for the targeted opening in spring of 2013. The role that our GlobalGiving donors are playing in this equipping and supplying stage is impressive. You have been with us from the early stages of construction, and you have supported our medical missions along with way, as the local team has increased in expertise and confidence in the complex procedures necessary for pediatric cardiac surgery. For that, we thank you, but there is more to be done if we are to succeed with the 2013 opening of the new Center.

The other success to be reported is the completion of our latest medical mission, led by Dr. Dominique Metras, a noted Cardio-Thoracic Surgeon from Marseille, France, and his truly international team. Dr. Metras gathered a team of colleagues from France (Paris, Marseille, and Bordeaux), Jerusalem, and Colombia to convene at La Mascota Children's Hospital in Managua. Dr. Metras reported smooth communication because a number of team members spoke fluent Spanish.

Surgery was performed on nine little patients (a tenth patient could not be accommodated for lack of the right equipment), five little girls and four little boys, ranging in age from nine months to 12 years. Because the local team has achieved a high leven of competency, the local staff surgeons at La Mascota led the surgery, and the visiting team collaborated and advised. This achievement is tremendous leap ahead in our program in Nicaragua.

Because of Hurricane Sandy, our team from Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York needed to reschedule its mission from November to February, 2013. They are all ready to go and eager to contribute their expertise in collaboration with the local team. This will be their first mission with Surgeons of Hope Foundation.

Remember that this progress is substantially supported by you, our GlobalGiving donors. Please remain with us as the active supporters and friends that you are, and let your friends know about us. We are a very small office in New York, with no budget allocation for public relations, so it is largely up to you to help us spread the word in conversation, and by Facebook and Twitter. There will be more positive news from us throughout 2013, so stay with us.

Young Patient Awaits Pre-op Evaluation

Operation Underway

Dr. Metras with Little Patient

Links:

To know more, visit our website

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