Operation Smile Honduras Opens Operating Rooms in Comprehensive Care Center Reflecting Organization’s 25th Anniversary Focus on Sustainability

Operation Smile Honduras will open the operating rooms of its new Comprehensive Care Center with a ceremony on Thursday, August 16, in Tegucigalpa.  Operation Smile CEO and Co-founder Dr. Bill Magee will be in attendance and perform several cleft lip surgeries with Operation Smile Honduras Medical Director Dr. Oscar Sarmiento. Operation Smile, a worldwide children’s medical charity dedicated to helping children and young adults born with facial deformities, is focusing its 25th anniversary on sustainability, with a goal of increasing the number of children served annually through establishment of regional centers of care.  Operation Smile volunteers have medically treated more than 100,000 children to date through international medical missions and in-country local missions around the world.  The Operation Smile Honduras Center is one of seven new centers to be opened this year which are projected to help increase that number to 20,000 patients per year by 2008, as well as an estimated 400% increase to 40,000 by the year 2010. 

The Center in Honduras has been open since February 17, 2006, providing speech therapy, psychological treatment, nutritional and surgery consultations and dental care.  To date, the Center has provided more than 1,700 consultations.  The Operation Smile Honduras Center will now provide surgeries to children who suffer from cleft lips and cleft palates year-round as well as provide education and training to medical professionals in the region.  It includes operating and recovery rooms as well as rooms for medical, dental, speech therapy, audiology, nutrition, psychological consultations, and administrative services to plan local missions staffed by Honduran medical teams.  The Center is the result of much effort and support provided by professionals, private groups, contributors, volunteers, and the participation of patients and their families.

According to Dr. Bill Magee: “When we first launched Operation Smile 25 years ago, we were focused on conducting international medical missions -- bringing teams from the U.S. to developing countries to provide cleft lip and cleft palate surgery where the need was strongest.  But as time went on, we began to work with in-country local medical volunteers, providing them with the training and equipment needed to support patients after the mission was complete.  Today, more than 60% of Operation Smile patients are being treated by these in-country medical teams.  And through the launch of our new Comprehensive Care Centers, our capacity and reach will continue to grow exponentially,” he added.
     
Dr. Oscar Sarmiento adds: “Operation Smile arrived in Honduras 10 years ago with a team of foreign volunteers to help our children. As we became involved, we realized that it was our role to meet the needs of our children. Upon inaugurating the clinic’s operating rooms, we are on the right path towards self-sufficiency via excellence, a dream that we have nurtured for a long time and have achieved thanks to the unconditional support of Operation Smile and of kind sponsors and local volunteers. Together we will continue moving forward and creating new smiles together.”

Operation Smile commemorates its 25th Anniversary with a year-long, multi-faceted series of initiatives that highlight the organization’s demonstrated capacity:

World Journey of Smiles – The year-long anniversary celebration will culminate in November 2007, with the World Journey of Smiles, 43 simultaneous missions in 25 countries. With a goal of treating an estimated 5,000 children living with facial deformities, World Journey of Smiles will take place from November 8-16, 2007.  To prepare for that initiative, plastic surgeons and anesthesiologists from 22 of those countries recently met at Operation Smile’s world headquarters in Norfolk, Va., to set global standards of care.

Global Standards of Care –The Global Standards of Care include a rigorous credentialing process and a standardization of medical supplies and equipment that will be based on the model of care that Operation Smile has perfected in 25 years of performing cleft lip and cleft palate surgeries.  State-of-the-art equipment valued at $3.6 million will be provided to partner countries to ensure that every patient treated by Operation Smile will benefit from the same sophisticated equipment, procedures, and highly trained and credentialed medical staff, no matter where they receive care around the world. Additionally, Operation Smile is providing emergency supplies in accordance with American Heart Association guidelines for pediatric and advanced cardiac life support.

Comprehensive Care Centers – Following the opening in Vietnam, Colombia, and India, Operation Smile will open additional Comprehensive Care Centers in Honduras, Morocco, China, and the Philippines.  Each Center will provide surgical treatment and post-operative follow-up for thousands of additional patients, especially those in remote areas.  The Centers will also help train medical volunteers, strengthen local development and fundraising activities and provide on-going administrative support for in-country activities.

International Forums on Medical Diplomacy – As part of its ongoing effort to create a global humanitarian network to bring healing to the world’s children, Operation Smile will host international forums on medical diplomacy. 

About Operation Smile Honduras
Operation Smile Inc. began its work in Honduras in 1997 by contributing all the necessary resources to conduct medical missions to aid those born with facial deformities. Operation Smile Honduras’s mission is to help patients from underprivileged populations with deformities by providing reconstructive plastic surgery, as well as providing continuous high standard interdisciplinary treatments to ultimately improve their quality of life and to facilitate their integration into society.  Since 1997, more than 1,700 children and young adults have received free reconstructive surgery to repair cleft lips, cleft palates and other facial deformities.  Operation Smile Honduras has conducted medical missions to Danlí, Choluteca, Tegucigalpa, Santa Rosa de Copan and Puerto Cortes. 

About Operation Smile (www.operationsmile.org)
Founded in 1982, Operation Smile, headquartered in Norfolk, Virginia, is a worldwide children’s medical charity whose network of global volunteers are dedicated to helping improve the health and lives of children and young adults.  Since its founding, Operation Smile has treated more than 100,000 children born with cleft lips, cleft palates and other facial deformities. In addition to contributing free medical treatment, Operation Smile trains local medical professionals in its 25 partner countries and leaves behind crucial equipment to lay the groundwork for long-term self-sufficiency.  Operation Smile commemorates its 25th Anniversary with a year-long, multi-faceted series of initiatives to promote sustainability and capacity-building among its 25 mission countries.  The year-long anniversary celebration will culminate in November 2007, with the World Journey of Smiles, 43 simultaneous missions in 25 countries, with a goal of providing new smiles and new lives for an estimated 5,000 children living with facial deformities.