So No Child Must Wait

Webster Fellow Teaching Local Medical Student

Amanda and Cookie
Originally uploaded by interplast.

Azogues, Ecuador - Assisting Amanda in this photo is Cookie, a local medical student who is bilingual. Here she´s learning from Amanda, and next week she´ll be translating for our doctors when they give lectures for the medical students at the local university.

Azogues, Ecuador: A Global University

This afternoon, Dr. Shankar Rai (plastic surgeon and Interplast Surgical Outreach Center director in Kathmandu, Nepal) and Dr. Amaia Arana (anesthesiologist) gave lectures at the Catholic University in Cuenca to local medical students, many of whom are taught by Dr. Quinde. They were surprised and thrilled to have approximately 150 students show up to hear their talks. Dr. Rai discussed his involvement with Interplast, and explained how Interplast's focus on education and local empowerment has really turned the organization into a global university. Dr. Rai was trained by Interplast and is now helping to train other local surgeons by going on surgical trips to other sites in Vietnam and South America. He also included many slides of burn cases he has treated in Nepal (I closed my eyes when it got too graphic so as not to faint) and many students approached him afterwards to copy his lecture on their computers. Dr. Arana also gave a wonderful lecture on pediatric anesthesia, and since she is originally from Spain (but now working in England), she was really able to interact with the audience in their native language which everyone really enjoyed.

To hear more from the rest of the Interplast surgical volunteer team and their patients in Azogues, Ecuador, check out the Azogues, Ecuador trip surgical trip blog.