Many patients with commonly encountered injuries and wounds could benefit from surgical treatment. However, due to a paucity of surgeons or medical officers with basic surgical training in rural areas and the developing world, many patients do not have access to these services. According to Debas, Gosselin, McCord, and Thind, an estimated 11% of the global disease burden can be treated with surgery*.
GHDonline is launching the Global Surgery Community with the guidance of moderators Nadine Semer, MD, MPH, FACS, a General and Plastic Surgeon who spends a portion of her time volunteering her services in rural areas of the developing world; Lubna Samad, MRCS, FCPS, a Pediatric Surgeon at the Indus Hospital in Pakistan; and Robert Riviello, MD, MPH, a Trauma and Acute Care General Surgeon at Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston, U.S. Surgeons and non-surgeons are invited to join this new community to “work together to define the burden of surgical disease and the barriers to accessing surgical care,” says Dr. Samad. “Being able to share views through the Global Surgery Community on GHDonline.org will be invaluable,” she adds.
For Dr. Semer, who published two practical guides for health care providers in resource-limited settings: The Help Guide to Basics of Wound Care and Practical Plastic Surgery for Nonsurgeons, the multidisciplinary discussions in GHDonline communities “really open up the potential for collaboration, offering fresh perspectives on recurring problems and fostering the development of new innovative solutions.”
The community went live following the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Burden of Surgical Disease Working Group attended by the moderators, and the return to Boston of Dr. Riviello after several weeks providing surgical care in Haiti. Dr. Riviello also received the CIMIT Young Clinician Award 2009 for his work developing and testing an innovative wound care technology for resource-limited settings.
Understanding the terminology is critical to health providers who wish to improve surgical care on the ground, so take a minute to access and enrich the Glossary of surgical terms in this interactive resource on GHDonline.
*Haile T. Debas, Richard Gosselin, Colin McCord, and Amardeep Thind, “Surgery.” 2006. Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries (2nd Edition),ed. , 1,245-1,260. New York: Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1596/978-0-821-36179-5/Chpt-67
