Our team, through Surgical Volunteers International, will travel to Huế, Vietnam in June 2026 to provide free, specialized reconstructive surgical care to children and young adults with congenital deformities and acquired conditions. These include cleft lip and palate, hand deformities, undescended testicles, facial anomalies, and trauma-related injuries. In addition to performing surgeries, we will collaborate closely with local physicians at Hue University of Medicine and Pharmacy to exchange knowledge, provide hands-on training, and strengthen local surgical capacity. This mission will deliver immediate, life-changing care while contributing to long-term improvements in surgical education and patient outcomes within the region.
This project serves underserved pediatric and young adult patients in central Vietnam who lack access to advanced reconstructive surgical care. Many of these individuals live in resource-limited settings where financial, geographic, and healthcare infrastructure barriers prevent timely treatment. We focus on this population because untreated congenital and traumatic deformities can significantly impact physical function, social integration, education, and long-term economic opportunity. By partnering with a respected local institution, we ensure that care is delivered to patients with the greatest need while supporting continuity of care within the local healthcare system.
The immediate impact will be the safe delivery of high-quality reconstructive surgeries that restore function, improve quality of life, and enhance social confidence for patients. Beyond the mission itself, our collaboration with local providers will support knowledge transfer, skill development, and sustainable improvements in surgical care delivery. Lessons learned from this mission—including clinical approaches, resource optimization strategies, and cross-cultural care models—will be integrated into future missions and shared within our organization to enhance long-term global health impact. Our goal is not only to treat patients during the mission but to contribute to a lasting framework for ongoing care and partnership.
The Doximity Foundation’s support made it possible for me to participate in a humanitarian surgical mission to Huế, Vietnam, where our multidisciplinary volunteer team partnered with Hue University of Medicine and Pharmacy to provide specialized reconstructive surgical care to patients with little or no access to these services.
During the mission, we screened 71 patients and performed 51 reconstructive operations, including cleft lip and palate repairs, microtia reconstruction, burn reconstruction, congenital hand surgery, pediatric urologic procedures, and other complex congenital and acquired reconstructive conditions. Many of these patients had lived for years with conditions that affected their ability to eat, speak, hear, work, attend school, or participate fully in their communities. Several families traveled hundreds of kilometers to reach our surgical camp because these specialized procedures were otherwise unavailable or financially unattainable.
One patient who particularly illustrates the impact of this mission was a four-month-old infant born with a bilateral cleft lip. His family lived approximately 700 kilometers from the nearest tertiary medical center and lacked the financial means to obtain specialized care. Through our mission, we provided transportation assistance, housing, meals, comprehensive preoperative evaluation, surgery, and postoperative care. For his parents, the operation represented far more than a repaired cleft—it offered hope for their son’s future and relief from the uncertainty they had carried since his birth.
The impact of the mission extended well beyond the operating room. Working alongside Vietnamese surgeons, anesthesiologists, nurses, residents, and medical students, we participated in educational conferences, intraoperative teaching, and collaborative patient care. This exchange of knowledge strengthened relationships between our teams and helped build local capacity for future patient care.
Our team also donated surgical instruments, medications, medical supplies, pulse oximeters, and other hospital equipment that will continue benefiting patients long after our departure. Additionally, we supported a local orphanage caring for 29 children who are wards of the state by providing school supplies and electric bicycles to help children travel to school, while establishing a long-term sponsorship program through our organization.
The Doximity Foundation’s travel support made all of this possible by enabling me to join our volunteer team overseas. Your investment did far more than fund airfare—it helped restore function, improve quality of life, strengthen international medical education, and create lasting partnerships that will continue serving patients for years to come.
