Americare Neurosurgery International (AMCANI) is a NGO founded by Monica Gerstner and Gary Heit after a 2001 trip to Cuzco, Peru. They were doing the standard medical aid model of coming into town and "helping" by cranking out cases. On the plane ride home, Monica asked Gary, "what happens now that we are gone?" That question was seminal to the idea behind AMCANI: sustainable medical development coupled with a big dose of environmental and social justice implemented via recycling used but functional medical equipment.
A young Vietnamese boy has a large brain tumor that, left untreated, will lead to the loss of sight in his left eye. Neurosurgeons serving Central Vietnam lack the modern neurosurgical tools to operate on many young patients like him. Delivery of a modern neurosurgical tools, which last for years and require low maintenance, to a competent neurosurgeon in a developing country can revolutionize their medical practice.
The equipment-plus-training model has been refined during the building of micro-neurosurgical services in the Department of Neurosurgery at Hue University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Hue, Vietnam. Hue has the only teaching center for central Vietnam and provides region-wide care for approximately 20,000,000 people.
We have expanded our activities there to include rehabilitation medicine, nurse education, vascular surgery, anesthesia, and Ob/Gyn.We are now expanding our efforts to a second site in the state of Rakhine, Myanmar, but with different objectives. Our focus there is to improve the state hospital system using the AMCANI model. We are collaborating with the Rahkine State and Federal level Ministries of Public Health, to restore the level of care in the 58 facility State Hospital System.
For every $4,000 we raise, we are able to ship a 40-foot cargo container full of desperately needed medical equipment to our mission sites in Vietnam & Myanmar.
Our volunteer medical teams train the local practitioners to use the donated equipment, but we need your help to get it there!
