GMA Extra: Giving life saving surgery to 10 people in need for Mandela Day with Operation Healing Hands
Operation Healing Hands will help 10 patients. Seven at each of the Pretoria Life Hospitals, over two weeks starting on Mandela Day on Monday 18 July 2016. All the patients are people in need, who have been waiting on lists for years. The operations include hip and knee replacements, ports for four children with cancer, reconstructive surgery for a cancer survivor who had a double mastectomy, tonsil removal and the removal of a cancerous vocal chord tumour.
GMA EXTRA 4 JULY 2016
Operation Healing Hands: Giving life saving and changing surgery to 10 people in need for Mandela Day
BACKGROUND: In 2009 International Nelson Mandela Day was launched in recognition of Nelson Mandela’s birthday on 18 July, via unanimous decision of the UN General Assembly.
It was inspired by a call Nelson Mandela made a year earlier, on his 90th birthday, for the next generation to take on the burden of leadership in addressing the world’s social injustices when he said that “it is in your hands now”. It is more than a celebration of Madiba’s life and legacy. It is a global movement to honour his life’s work and act to change the world for the better.
Operation Healing Hands is the idea of a Pretoria orthopedic surgeon, to get her colleges friends and medical supply companies, to give of their time, skill, services and products in the private medical field, to help 10 people who cannot afford private health care, with life saving and changing surgeries. She had no difficulty convincing others in her field to participate and the result is an NPO, supported by more than 20 medical practitioners, support skills and two hospitals: Life Eugene Marais and Life Groenkloof.
Operation Healing Hands will now help 10 patients: at each of the Pretoria Life Hospitals, over two weeks starting on Mandela Day on Monday 18 July 2016.
All the patients are people in need, who have been waiting on lists for years. The operations include hip and knee replacements, ports for four children with cancer, reconstructive surgery for a cancer survivor who had a double mastectomy, tonsil removal and the removal of a cancerous vocal chord tumour. All medical treatment, surgery, aftercare for three months and medication will be provided for these patients free of charge!
Listen to Good Morning Angels on 6 and 13 July, to meet the patients who will benefit from Operation Healing Hands.