Today I’m heading to Kigali, Rwanda, the build extra than 400 main global lecturers, policymakers, and healthcare specialists will catch on the Pan-African Surgical Conference to address a well-known global neatly being distress: bringing salvage actual of entry to to comprehensive surgical care nearer to patients’ homes.
This necessary gathering has me reflecting on a day out I took with my husband, plastic surgeon Bill Magee, extra than 40 years previously to the Philippines to relieve youngsters in want of life-altering surgical procedures. We dreamed of the usage of our healthcare expertise to lift new smiles to youngsters who wanted cleft lip and palate surgical procedures. We operated on 40 youngsters nonetheless had to shrink again 300 extra. The want modified into once overwhelming—no longer simply for cleft care, nonetheless all surgical procedures in the Philippines and dozens of different countries worldwide.
We additionally realized that in lots of places, there modified into once an absence of expert physicians, nurses, equipment, and infrastructure, no longer simply for cleft care nonetheless for trusty surgical procedures of every model. What started with a minute bit one with a cleft condition led us to a neighborhood, which showed us the need for a movement. That second sparked Operation Smile, which modified into once founded on the conclusion that while you understand a want, you rob action toward addressing that want.
Today, we accumulate helped over 400,000 patients worldwide with surgical care, while supporting thousands extra who received free comprehensive care products and services. What started in a village in the Philippines has develop into a world group that works completely in 37 countries.
Nonetheless the need is gathered so huge. Worldwide over 5 billion other people—extra than two-thirds of the realm’s population—lack salvage actual of entry to to trusty, reasonable surgical treatment.
Real commerce happens when care is local. That’s why we accumulate developed our contrivance to focal level on coaching and equipping in-country surgeons and scientific teams to lift life-saving procedures of their communities.
We work closely with local scientific leaders, neatly being ministries, universities, accrediting institutions, NGOs, and global organizations. We hear to our in-country professionals, support them, and learn from them to power influence.
In Africa we operate in 12 countries, working with top surgical and anesthesiology institutions to raze a sustainable workforce. Our work in Africa started in Kenya in 1987, and in 2025, we’re expanding to Tanzania. Our key partners—COSECSA, CANECSA, the American Heart Association, and the World Federation Society of Anesthesia—relieve us practice and equip Africa’s subsequent period of surgeons and anesthesiologists.
In Rwanda, a nation of 13 million, there had been simply two plastic surgeons when our work there began. Households in quest of cleft surgical treatment traveled lots of of miles—entirely to be turned into away. To commerce this, we partnered with the Rwandan authorities, introducing a hub-and-spoke model that trains scientific professionals in the community. Today, Rwanda is scaling this model nationwide, and we’re proud to support this effort alongside the Rwanda Surgical Society, the College of Rwanda, and the Rwandan Ministry of Health.
Our influence is right: from two plastic surgeons to nearly two dozen, and from one country to a continent-large movement. All over Africa, 55 universities and institutions are coaching the following period of surgeons, decentralizing care, and reducing costs for patients.
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This work is extra than surgical treatment—it is some distance a machine commerce that will future-proof salvage actual of entry to to surgical treatment. By strengthening local expertise, reducing reliance on out-of-country scientific support, and equipping governments with right-time neatly being information, we’re constructing a sustainable future for surgical care in Africa.
On the Pan-African Surgical Conference in Kigali, global specialists will reach together to push this agenda ahead. Only by bringing trusty, genuine surgical treatment nearer to home can we lift hope, accumulate a lengthy-lasting influence, and be sure that no patient is left in the lend a hand of.
Kathy Magee is the co-founder, president, and CEO of Operation Smile and a registered nurse.
