The Latest From The Field

Report from TecateSmiles Mission to Mexico May 2023
Partnership Projects of Children’s Lifeline & Smiles International Number of patients prescreened via new remote answering service: 38 Cases pre-selected for reconstruction on 2.5 day mission surgical days: 16 Number of cases rescheduled due to medical reasons developed: 6 Number…

Mission Report: Guayaquil, Ecuador Pediatric Heart Surgery March 2023
March 5-17 - Hospital del Nino Dr. Francisco de Icaza Bustamante, Guayaquil, Ecuador Mission Objectives On this occasion, CardioStart’s International mission team made a return visit to the Hospital del Nino Dr. Francisco de Icaza Bustamante in Guayaquil, Ecuador on…

Report from CaboSmiles Mission to Mexico February 2023
Partnership Projects of Children’s Lifeline & Smiles International Number of patients prescreened via new remote answering service: 45Cases selected for reconstruction on 4.5 day mission surgical days: 22Number of cases canceled due to transportation conflict from La Paz: 1Surgical reconstructive…

Report from TecateSmiles Mission to Mexico November 2022
Partnership Projects of Children’s Lifeline & Smiles International Number of patients prescreened via new remote answering service: 210Number of patients allowed to come for anesthesia clearance: 15Cases selected for reconstruction on 2.5 day mission surgical days: 9Number of cases rescheduled…

Report from Pediatric Cardiac Mission to Cambodia, July/August 2022
Rady Children’s Hospital / UCSDMission: Cambodia 22 July- 3 August, 2022Susan Grossfeld, MPH and Paul Grossfeld, MD At a Glance This was the Grossfeld's and CLI's first collaboration with Chenla Children's Healthcare in CambodiaThe region has a well-established need for…

Results of April 2022 Cardiac Mission to Dominican Republic
They had a very successful trip led by Dr. Robert Ross. Seven doctors and one nurse were part of the mission. They were able to teach and mentor the local team and performed 10 open heart operations, 16 catheterizations in…

History of CLI Pediatric Cardiac Missions in Guayaquil, Ecuador
History of the Penn State University College of Medicine and The Hospital de Ninos Roberto Children’s Hospital in Guayaquil, Ecuador Dr. John L Myers, MD is Professor of Surgery and Pediatrics at Penn State University College of Medicine in Hershey,…

Status of Panama Pediatric Cardiac Program
Panama and Central American Pediatric Cardiology MissionsSummary as of Jan 2020. History:Children’s Lifeline originally contacted pediatric heart surgeon Ross Ungerleider, at OHSU at that time, about starting pediatric heart surgical missions to Panama (Annie Mendenhall was a specific contact.) Ross…

Panama / Dr. Michael Womack / Children’s Lifeline
1) It is hard to be as excited about diagnostic caths or TEE (trans-esophageal echo) as interventional caths, but when they are the only way to know how to take care of someone, they are obviously critically useful. One patient…

Cambodia / Dr. Paul Grosssfeld
This year the focus was to provide clinical and bedside training to inpatient cardiac patients, outpatient cardiac patients, lectures to medical students, staff physicians and support staff. In addition, we were able to follow up with eight past surgical patients.…

Panama / Dr. Michael Womack / Children’s Lifeline
Overall, another good trip. We lost a day in the lab with a water main bursting in the street by the hospital. But we had some “firsts” on the trip in terms of devices used in a couple of situations,…
Dominican Republic / CEDIMAT Hospital
Surgical Team Make-Up: 1 pediatric surgeon 2 pediatric anesthesiologist 2 pediatric cardiologists 3 pediatric ICU physicians 1 pediatric ICU registered nurse 1 Respiratory Therapist 1 pump perfusionist NEW FACILITY: The new building is beautiful, spacious and well equipped with all…

Ghana, West Africa / Hearts and Minds of Ghana / Children’s Lifeline
The Hearts and Minds of Ghana team preformed their 100th open heart surgery on November 14, 2015. The goal has always been to have a self sustaining Pediatric Cardiac Surgery program in Ghana and they are well on their way.…

Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
CardioStart undertook a mission to the Clinica Corazones Unidos Hospital. The mission focused entirely on developing and teaching the management of children needing congenital cardiac correction. The staff worked on a total of 7 children (ages from 2 years -…

Port Antonio, Jamaica / West Africa
The team set up medical clinics in Port Antonio, Jamaica and provided primary medical care to children and adults. In total they saw 678 children. The main complaint and diagnosis's was allergies and asthma, also treated malnutrition, parasites, worms, tropical…