Above is a scene from my 2007 trip to a tiny little town in Guatemala called Nuevo Progreso. A long flight to Guatemala City, followed by a long bus ride into the southwestern corner of Guatemala, up a narrow winding road to the Hospital de la Familia. The colorful crowd in the photo is an energetic yet serene assortment of patients and their families, waiting to be seen in the busy surgical clinics.
The photo above is from my 2007 trip to Guanajuato, Mexico. These little ones were enjoying a reception the staff throws for their honored patient-guests every year. The babies are always incredibly sweet and inevitably end up stealing your heart.
Partially sponsored by Smile Train, two intense days of cleft lip and palate surgeries were tempered by our gallant host, Dr. Abel de la Pena, who organized a fun international crew of surgeons.
A few satisfied customers in Mexico. It is such a privilege to be a plastic surgeon, and you never feel it more intensely than on these trips. For more photos, including some of Dr. Weintraub's trip, you can click here.I am very excited to be going on another cleft trip soon, this time to China: two weeks at a hospital in Hunan province, with a team of almost forty American medical providers and about twenty more local Chinese staff. There were rumors of internet access, so I'll keep my fingers crossed on being able to blog from the trip.
Some of you might wonder, How is there time for me to spend two weeks in China? I would be tempted to respond, How is there not time?
I am very grateful to Dr. Weintraub and to our shared philosophy of giving back at Duet Plastic Surgery. We fiercely believe in the good that these mission trips achieve, and we have chosen to incorporate its spirit into our practice.
