+ Message from the President
+ A New Level of Success
+ 2010 RVPC Fellow
+ Georgian Med Tech Trains in Moldova
+ Trauma Conference in Roatan
+ Spotlight: ImmucorGamma
+ International Pediatric Outreach Project
+ Helmer in Moldova
+ Hemasoft Installs LIS in Dominica
+ Our Route to Moldova: Pasha Group
+ Iowa Lutherna Hospital Trains Georgian Tech

By now, everyone has heard of the catastrophic devastation in Haiti from Wednesday's earthquake centered just outside the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince. There are a few great organizations selflessly pulling together resources at this time of crisis. We strongly encourage everyone to donate whatever they can to Partners in Health, and pass along the message to friends and family to do the same. Click here to donate on the Partners in Health site.

Partners in Health, co-founded by Dr. Paul Farmer and Ophelia Dahl, has over 20 years of experience in Haiti and is fully integrated into the local communities. Haitians are looking to them during this time of crisis as a refuge and source of medical care. They cannot continue this assistance alone. You can donate to their efforts on their site by clicking here.

View all up-to-date information on Haiti at PIH's new site, Stand With Haiti.

Traveling to Moldova last month reminded me of the many former Soviet Union countries I have had the opportunity to visit in the past 20 years.

The difference however, was the extremely high level of motivation from both the local medical team and the Moldovan Government.  I witnessed the successful implementation of ideas and the formation of partnerships. I also witnessed highly technical medical equipment in use. The Moldovan Minister of Health is properly financing the centers in order to make the best use of this equipment. In the end, this truly helps the people of Moldova. The local medical teams, like most medical teams we work with, were extremely excited to learn new techniques and make changes within their system based on the knowledge obtained from our trainers.

I had the pleasure of cutting the red ribbon with the Vice Minister and the Director of the Oncology Institute at the opening ceremony. The center is a true partnership between Global Healing, our sponsors, Gedeon Richter, an Austrian pharmaceutical company, the Oncology Institute and the Moldovan Minister of Health.  Gedeon Richter provided the cost of the renovation of the center and the Minister of Health funded the incremental cost increase of operating the new blood center as well as the annual budget. Global Healing and our generous corporate sponsors donated the medical equipment, and all of the training.

It was truly a motivating experience, and due to the Moldovan commitment and partnership we have, Global Healing will continue our work in this country for the next two years. We will work to help the Moldovan National Blood Transfusion Center equip and train at the Cahul Regional Center as well as four additional blood centers in hospitals located in Moldova’s capital city, Chisinau.

Most notably, I would like to recognize Nina Ekudize who joined Global Healing’s medical training team. Nina has worked as a lab technician for over six years at the Jo Ann Medical Center in Tbilisi, Georgia. She specializes in Abbott’s Cell Dyn hematology analyzers. Over the past six years, she has been a recipient of Global Healing’s training trips to Georgia. Now she is helping us train her Moldovan counterparts. Whenever we train across borders, we reach new levels of success.

I had the opportunity to travel with David Helmer, CEO of Helmer, Inc. Helmer is one of our most valuable partners and it was David’s first time to see his equipment in action at one of Global Healing’s blood bank projects. As always, many thanks to our US medical team for without them none of this would be possible. Thank you for volunteering your time and expertise with your Moldovan counterparts.

Thank you to all our partners and volunteers who work diligently to make all Global Healing’s medical projects a success.

Looking forward to continuing our successful work in 2010!

Cindy Basso Eaton

Global Healing has already achieved its first objective in
Moldova: successful transfer of the Oncology Institute Blood Bank and transfusion service to local control. The Ministry of Health has agreed to cover the increased annual costs that the Oncology Institute will incur as they use more sensitive methods.

Over the first half of November, the Oncology Institute Blood Bank staff received direct instruction on modern blood typing, screening and crossmatching methods. The prior method for blood group typing and compatibility testing employed throughout Moldova lacked the sensitivity to detect subtle but important reactions between donor and patient blood. Gina Giannarelli MT(ASCP) of the University of California, San Francisco Blood Center was instrumental in providing education and hands-on training to prepare her Moldovan counterparts to begin using the new method of crossmatching.

As the Oncology Institute changes its hospital transfusion service, careful attention is directed toward ensuring full physician support of the developments in their transfusion service. Dr.Chris Gresens of BloodSource in Sacramento, California worked alongside physicians to address their concerns and begin explaining future changes to the blood service.

Biomedical engineering and equipment maintenance are integral components of any medical endeavor. Without a competent and willing maintenance staff, expensive and life-saving medical equipment can easily fall to the wayside. Ron Newton CLS, EE, CE continued the progress made in June 2009 to provide continuing education to the engineers at the major medical institutions. During the last training in November, he discussed microprocessor functionality in-depth to enhance their capabilities to repair and troubleshoot.

Global Healing looks forward to 2010 as we continue training on advanced testing methodology and assist the local team in scaling the model we have implemented for other sites in Moldova.

Global Healing is delighted to introduce Dra. Sara Sadrzadeh, the Roatan Volunteer Pediatric Clinic Fellow for the year 2010. She will be the fifth Honduran doctor to spend a year in the Clinic.

Dra. Sara is a native of San Pedro Sula. A graduate of the medical school at the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH) in Tegucigalpa, she will be completing her Social Service at the Roatan Public Hospital at the end of 2009. Although still not sure of her future medical specialty, she is interested in pediatrics. She speaks Spanish, English and Farsi and has done translation work for Oxfam, the English NGO. Her travels are extensive, including the US, Canada, throughout Central America, the United Kingdom, Italy, Turkey, Israel, South Africa and Swaziland. For relaxation, she enjoys reading, travelling and snorkeling in Roatan.

We look forward to working with Dra. Sara.

In 2000, Global Healing undertook its first blood banking project at the Jo Ann Medical Center in Tbilisi, Georgia. It was during this trip that Lee Schuller MT(ASCP)SBB and Lillian Morton RN trained Nina Enukidze (below), among others, in blood typing, antibody screening and compatibility testing.

Over the last five years, Nina has gone on to receive training from Abbott as a field engineer working on hematology analyzers. It was the original seed that Global Healing planted and Nina’s ambition that combined to produce an ideal candidate for our last trip to Moldova. Nina was quick to adapt to the local situation, coming from a former Soviet state herself. She trained over a dozen employees to operate, maintain and repair the Cell Dyn 3700, and conducted all the trainings in Russian. Nina also assisted in training the Oncology Institute personnel in new compatibility testing techniques.

Global Healing is happy to work with Nina, not simply for the expertise and professionalism that she brings to the table, but for the demonstration of what ambition and determination can achieve.

The Third Annual Global Healing Trauma Conference took place at Plaza Mar, Coxen Hole, Roatan on Saturday, August 8, 2009. Over fifty physicians, nurses, paramedics and other health care professionals attended. This year, the Conference emphasized Pediatric Trauma. Speakers included Dr. Enrique Tome (right), a pediatric surgeon on the faculty of the medical school in Tegucigalpa as well as Dr. Indira Sanchez who is the surgeon at the Roatan Public Hospital. We were fortunate to be able to include Dr. Janice Louie of the California State Department of Health who gave a timely presentation on H1N1 influenza.

ImmucorGamma is an industry leader in blood bank reagent manufacturing. Their support of Global Healing projects extends to 2000 when they donated blood bank reagents to the Jo Ann Medical Center Blood Bank. When we started our program in Gyumri, Armenia, ImmucorGamma assisted again. We are fortunate enough to renew that partnership, this time for Moldova.

Providing high quality, sensitive reagents to Moldova is essential to the progress of their national blood service. Without the initial gift, professionals in Moldova would not have looked to ImmucorGamma as a potential supplier. This example of giving is a model of philanthropy that demonstrates how all parties benefit through corporate donations.

Thank You to everyone at ImmucorGamma!

Our most recent grant recipient
is the International Pediatric Outreach Project (IPOP). The organization operates at two project sites, offering a diverse array of programs.

In Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, IPOP has developed a clinical and educational physical therapy program, an initiative to improve neonatal and pediatric inpatient care, as well as an annual educational seminar covering topics selected by the local medical team.

IPOP also works in Saragur, India, a rural locale with a highly marginalized population. They began the School Health Screening Program which provides thousands of students with a free health screen, as well as on site treatment for intestinal parasites and Vitamin A prophylaxis to protect against blindness. The screening program also provides physicians the chance to deliver general health education to the young students. IPOP also provides an educational seminar to local practitioners.

Visit their website for more info.

Already nine years have passed since Helmer Inc first donated a platelet incubator-agitator combination to the new Jo Ann Medical Center Blood Bank. That genesis has turned into one of Global Healing’s most rewarding partnerships that has now spanned two continents and is looking towards even broader horizons.

Global Healing had the pleasure of bringing David Helmer, owner and founder of Helmer Inc, to Moldova to witness first-hand the impact of Helmer equipment. The storage equipment replaced equipment dating from the 1970s and 80s. The new equipment ensures that the high quality blood products being produced are not compromised by inadequate storage conditions at the hospital.

“It was a sincere pleasure to be a part of the Global Healing team that traveled to The Republic of Moldova," David Helmer said. "As I observed the results of the transformation that has taken place at the Oncology Institute, I was proud to be a small part of what Global Healing had accomplished. Having visited blood banks the world over, I was impressed with the new level of capability that was created in process, people and equipment. This facility will serve as a model for the rest of the country and will also be a strategic part of securing the blood supply for the population. I have seen few organizations that have operated with the efficiency and effectiveness of Global Healing.”

In November, Hemasoft installed installed and trained the hospital laboratory personnel to operate Hemasoft’s Laboratory Information System at Princess Margaret Hospital (PMH) in Dominica. The installation represents the main step towards a full computerized recordkeeping system at the hospital laboratory. Hemasoft offered a substantial discount for the software package, enabling more licenses and interfaces to be installed and thus, more flexibility in use.

To complement the information system, Global Healing will continue in 2010 to transition the hospital laboratory into barcode technology. Manual transcription increases the likelihood of errors. In a hospital laboratory, inaccurate labelling and recordkeeping can be fatal. The electronic system will enable speedy and reliable processing of specimens and epidemiological data.

In addition to quickly determining the logistics of freight from California to Moldova, Pasha Group granted us a discount. Their assistance enabled vital medical equipment and supplies to reach its destination in Chisinau, Moldova.

Thank you to everyone at the Pasha Group who assisted in the effort!

Wayne Wieand, cardiac catheterization technologist as well as Russ McKernan, cardio vascular computer specialist from Iowa Lutheran Hospital spent time training their counterpart, David Shubitidze from the Jo Ann Medical Center in Tbilisi for ten days in Des Moines, Iowa. David was able to observe cases to learn the application of the catheterization system as well as to understand the imaging computer system. Lutheran Hospital donated a CPX 3100CV Cardio-Vascular X-Ray Generator to work with the catheterization lab in 2009.