2011 Report To Gift Of Life International Stakeholders

Preamble

Over the past year I have used these words in my reports to you. These words have described the families and children that await our help around the world and they have illuminated individual efforts to help children and global initiatives to develop sustainable programs that will for the first time lead to reliable care for children in their own countries. It is these words that often transcend actual actions and provide the vehicle to communicate the successes of our efforts. However, the beauty of our accomplishments this year has been in the actions themselves. The actions of Rotarians and healthcare professionals alike in countries around the world have directly resulted in Gift of Life programs increasing their capacity to help more and more children. The following report will outline for you the programs we put in place to address the action items outlined last year.

We have solidified global partnerships allowing us to provide care for children in the countries of their birth. We are working to develop centers of excellence on a regional basis so to provide hope to children that in the past could not have dreamed of being able to getting the life-saving surgeries they so desperately needed. Families have been provided with the hope they never thought would come….with the love they never thought was present….with a future for their children that at one time only seemed to be a dream. Indeed, we are making dreams a reality for more and more children every year.

Skills Transfer/Empowerment
The training visits serve to empower the doctors and nurses to care for their own children. Since 2009 we have coordinated 6 training visits to UHI. We have organized the following medical partners to support our efforts in Uganda: Chain of Hope UK, Riley Hospital for Children from Indiana, and the National Children's Hospital of Washington, DC. There is a defined Ugandan Pediatric Cardiac Team In place that works with the visiting teams. Professor Sir Magdhi Yacoub is the Senior Medical Advisor for our program in Ugandan with Dr. Craig Sable (National Children's Hospital) as the Medical Director of our efforts at UHI. Dr. Mark Turrentine (Riley Hospital for Children) is the other surgeon that rounds out our training team. We will need to have an additional anesthesiologist and Intensive Care doctor added to the team. In 2012 we are planning an additional 4 training visits to UHI.

Sustainability
It is important to note that we have received a commitment from the Ugandan Government to fund 100 surgeries next year at UHI. (For the first time ever, $500,000 has been set aside for the pediatric cardiac program at UHI) A Memorandum of Understanding is finalized which commits the Government, UHI Administration, Rotary and Gift of Life International to the development of a sustainable pediatric cardiac surgery program. I know of no other such financial commitment given by a government in any similar program being developed today. The First Lady of Uganda has personally endorsed this program and is now a committed advocate, as is the Minister of Health. Ugandan businesses have begun to contribute monies directly to our efforts and the Rotary support we are receiving (both financial and logistical) is second to none. We expect over $200,000 in Rotary Foundation Matching grants this coming year. The GOL programs in Rotary Districts 6560 and 5340 and the Rotary Club of the Pelhams are major sponsors of our efforts at UHI, as are NECO and the Countess Moira Foundation.

The Ugandan Government has constructed an annex to the hospital which will house an operating theatre and Catheterization lab. This will be dedicated to the pediatric cardiac program and is expected to be operational by February 2012.

Skills Transfer/Empowerment
In 2011 Gift of Life International coordinated 6 training visits to Hospital Bloom and Hospital Diagnostico (5 visits were to Hospital Bloom and focused on open heart surgery and 1 visit was to Hospital Diagnostico and focused on interventional catheterizations). The medical partners for our program in El Salvador are: Hearts With Hope (Dr. Chuck Alejos/Dr. Hillel Laks), Driscoll Children's Hospital (Dr. Mark Morales), University of Michigan (Dr. Eric Devaney) and Children's Hospital of Los Angeles (Dr. Win Wells). Our Senior Advisor to the program in El Salvador is world renowned Dr. Aldo Castaneda, a pioneer of pediatric cardiac surgery. The Salvadoran Surgical Team is perhaps the most complete of the 3 programs.  We will need to add an additional perfusionist. The nursing staff of the pediatric cardiac program has received 6 months of training and receives positive remarks from all visiting teams. We have an incentive program in place which provides additional funding to all doctors and nurses that participate in our program. In 2012 we are expecting to conduct an additional 5 training visits to Hospital Bloom. Additionally, GOLI Director Fredlee Kaplan has instituted a dynamic training program: the ‘Education and Support Program for Families; Family Systems and Mindfulness Training for medical residents, nurses, social workers and psychologists'.

Sustainability
The sustainable partners we have aligned in El Salvador are: GOL Florida, GOL Los Angeles, GOL Rotary District 7500 (New Jersey), GOL New Jersey (Rotary District 7470) and Digicel El Salvador. We are continuing our efforts to enlist the support of Salvadoran businesses. Digicel El Salvador has clearly been the leader by contributing $250,000 to our cause over the past two years. This Christmas season they have a tremendous media campaign to publicize their efforts and to help garner greater corporate support for our efforts. The Minister of Health is a significant supporter of our initiative and we fully expect to receive Government funding during the upcoming year. Sustainability will be our major focus in 2012 with an eye on soliciting support from the Taiwanese Government.

Sustainability
The GOLI relationship with Digicel led to their pledging of $1.1 million to construct the new cardiac unit at Bustamante Hospital. The unit is expected to be operational in September of 2012. We are now in the process of raising $3 million for equipment to outfit the ICU, Operating room and catheterization lab. We are working with our partners in Jamaica and elsewhere to raise this money. We have a major fundraiser planned for late December in Jamaica during which time we expect to raise $500,000. Additionally, we have three Rotary grants in the works for over $240,000 (one grant of $80,000 has already been approved by Rotary International). A Memorandum of Understanding was signed by the Government, Bustamante Hospital Administration, Chain of Hope UK and GOLI. This agreement stipulates Government and hospital support to retain highly-trained healthcare providers that are assigned to the pediatric cardiac program. The Jamaican Government is an engaged and supportive partner. We recently instituted a steering committee which has representatives of the Government, Hospital, Jamaican Pediatric Cardiac Team and GOLI/Chain of Hope Jamaica. This committee is intended to ensure proper communication between all stakeholders.

NOTE: Although training teams varied in composition, in general they were comprised of: surgeons, perfusionists, cardiologists, anesthesiologists, critical care doctors, respiratory therapists, Operating Room nurses and critical care nurses.

2011 Programs Of Focus

Haiti
In Haiti we have begun the effort to create a context for the development of a sustainable pediatric cardiac surgical program. Our partners in this effort are: Dr. Alain Delouche (Chain of Hope Paris), Dr. Ernest Benjamin (Mt. Sinai Hospital, NY), and Dr. Francois Lecour-Gayet (surgeon, Montefiore Medical Center for Children, NY). Additionally, the newly-founded GOL Haiti will play a major role in GOLI's efforts. GOLI Director George Solomon and I have visited Haiti twice this year and a short-term goal of conducting 8 surgical missions over the next 2 years has been put in place. These surgical missions will see a minimum of 64 Haitian children receive life-saving surgery while we identify the nucleus of a Haitian Pediatric Cardiac Team. We continue to work to establish a base of our operations for these surgical missions. We are reviewing a couple of possible locations and hope to have this important detail finalized by the end of the year. Our goal is to conduct the first of the four 2012 missions in April. It would appear that HealthCare International will be an additional partner in this effort. It is crucial to first create the foundation of successfully operating on the children during the 8 surgical missions. Due to the lack of Government support, a partnering hospital and a pediatric cardiac surgery team with which to work, we must first develop some sort of context to proceed. GOLI's only obligations are to fund two surgical missions in 2012 and an additional two in 2013. George Solomon will coordinate this funding through 4 separate matching grants.

Dominican Republic
Through coordination with the Chairman of our Dominican GOL and GOLI Director, Jordi Gasso, we have set a strategy to sponsor training missions to A. Grullon Hospital in Santiago that are conducted by organizations other than ICHF while looking to finish the nurse training program that was begun years ago. We expect to have the training visit take place before the summer of 2012 and look to have the nurse training completed in the near future. Our GOL New England and GOL 7980 are co-sponsoring a matching grant to fund this training visit. The GOL Albany has been approached to fund a team from Albany Medical Center that will conduct the training. Lynda Hammond and I will be meeting with the GOL Albany in the near future. Additionally, we will evaluate the ability to finish nurse training at CEDIMAT in Santo Domingo.

Kosovo
Our Kosovo GOL has done a wonderful job of identifying children in need and working to find help for them. Over the past two years, 9 Kosovan children have been provided a second chance at life, a truly impressive accomplishment for a fledgling program with minimal resources.

Italy
Our GOL ITALY of New York has developed a strong relationship with Dr. Crupi from Bergamo and thanks to this relationship 8 children have received life-saving surgeries over the past 3 years at Osperdale de Riuniti in Bergamo. These children have come from both Uganda and El Salvador and have been part of the ‘Our Hearts Are in Uganda' and ‘Our Hearts Are in El Salvador' global initiatives. My visit this past October was scheduled so I could escort a very ill Salvadoran girl for her surgery. Additionally, I was able to meet with Dr. Crupi to discuss his interest at working with Mater Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya. My goal is to coordinate Dr. Crupi's efforts with the interests our GOL Florida and GOL NE Ohio programs to help the healthcare professionals at Mater through training visits.

The Philippines
Perhaps the program with the highest volume of requests for help is our GOL Philippines. We regularly get an average of 2 requests per week for help from Filipino parents. This past year our programs based in the Makati West Rotary Club and the Cebu Rotary Club helped over 20 children. Thanks to the efforts of Filipino Rotarians and the support of Rotarian Lou Del Rosario (Vice Chairman of the GOL of RD 7230) many Filipino children have been treated in the past decade. This program continues to be one that needs greater support from GOLI and will be a country of focus in 2012.

4. Marketing Gift Of Life International

Our 2011 Action Plan called for the development of a marketing package that could be used for increasing the awareness of GOLI's efforts while increasing our access to reliable funding sources. The final package is in the process of being completed and it is my hope to have it provided to the Board for review by the second week of January. The packet will focus on the network of GOL that makes up GOLI and the role that GOLI plays in maximizing that networks potential to reach more and more children on a regular basis. A strong focus will be on the three Core programs that we are developing in Uganda, El Salvador and Jamaica. Additionally, this marketing effort will tie in our global partnerships with like-minded organizations such as SACH (Israel), Heartgift (USA), Chain of Hope UK (England), Fundacion Aldo Castaneda (Guatemala), Digicel and Chain of Hope Paris (France). Lastly, it is my goal to approach the Gates Foundation and make a plea for their direct involvement in our efforts to develop sustainable programs in Uganda, El Salvador and Jamaica.

5. Unfinished Business

Items that were not completed from the Action Plan we established for 2011 include the completion of surveys from all GOL programs and a year-end meeting of all programs. Although we have received surveys from 21 of our programs we do lack this information from the remaining 49. The goal is to have a focused request put out to all programs on the 1st of January. Although we held a conference call in June at which time all programs were invited to attend, I believe that it remains a worthy aim to assemble all our programs, together, in person, sometime in the near future. I would envision a type of congress where each program would discuss the best practices they employ to help children in need of our assistance.