A Q&A with Jeanie Barjum, Executive Director of Operation Smile Honduras.
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Inspiring stories
Explore Stories
In northwestern Rwanda, six month old Adolphe receives much needed care thanks to Operation Smile.
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Joycelyn was abandoned by her mother because of her cleft. She needed urgent help. Thankfully Operation Smile and a lady called Cynthia stepped in to give her the love and care she needed.
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Last year we welcomed three new trustees to our UK Board of Trustees. One of the three, Diana Dalton, tells us more about her experiences during her first 12 months with Operation Smile.
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Clinical nurse specialist and Operation Smile volunteer Jackie uses her skills as an educator to improve care for patients with cleft conditions. She tells us more about her experience training local teams in Ethiopia.
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We catch up with volunteer anaesthetist Mohan, who has recently returned from an Operation Smile surgical programme in China. Mohan’s been an Operation Smile volunteer for 10 years and tells us more about his experiences.
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This beautiful smile belongs to Jupiter. Today he’s a confident and happy 14 year old who loves basketball. But, his beaming smile is a world apart from the lonely little boy we first met ten years ago. A shy four year old who was teased because of his cleft condition.
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Surgeon and biostatistics leader Dr. Caroline Yao explains how the new technology is being piloted at the organisation – and is the subject of the new branded series presented by Partnership on AI (PAI) and produced by BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions, “Beyond the Code.”
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In our last financial year, we’ve trained local teams, invested in healthcare facilities and brought safe cleft care to more people, closer to home. Here’s some of the highlights from FY23/24, from Malawi to Madagascar.
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Programme updates
Find out how our surgical programmes are strengthening local health systems and training the next generation of medical leaders.
Training anaesthetists in Rwanda
Anaesthesia is vital to the delivery of safe surgery, but there is a dramatic shortage of trained anaesthetists in Rwanda. In this densely populated country, 11.9 million people are served by just 15 anaesthetists and anaesthesiologists.
Dr Paulin Banguti is working to fill this void – he’s director of the post-graduate anaesthesia programme at the University of Rwanda. During the March 2016 Operation Smile surgical training rotation at Rwinkwavu District Hospital, he led a group of anaesthesia residents to observe and learn from volunteer anaesthesiologists from around the world.
Strengthening health systems in Malawi
To enable Operation Smile to serve and treat more people living with cleft conditions, we focus on increasing the surgical capacity of low-and middle-income countries like Malawi so that cleft care for local people can continue, even after a surgical programme ends.
Operation Smile Malawi has worked to encourage and educate local surgeons, doctors and nurses, and now has nearly 50 percent of its medical volunteers from Malawi. Surgical training rotations train and empower local surgeons to help their own communities and strengthen health systems for the future.
