The new burns unit at the IMSS Centro Medical de Occidente in Guadalajara is on a par with any other comparable facility in the developed world, says David Herndon, medical director of the Shriners Hospital in Galveston, Texas.
“I’m very proud of the doctors and the work they are doing in the burns unit,” he said during a recent visit.
Herndon was keen to address criticism of the center that had surfaced in the media after ten children who suffered burns in a fire at a day-care center in Hermosillo were airlifted to the hospital two weeks ago.
Herndon visited the four children who remain at the IMSS hospital in Guadalajara. Two of the original ten have since died and four others have been sent to specialist Shriners hospitals in the United States. The death toll from the day-care center fire stands at 47.
Herndon headed a team of 18 Shriners doctors and medical staff who were taking part in a program to assess burned children that started nine years ago. During the weekend, medics checked 144 children from the western Mexico region and programmed 30 surgeries for them for the next six months. Doctors performed surgery on 12 children while others were selected for treatment in the United States.
Shrine hospitals in Sacramento and Los Angeles, along with Shrine burn centers in Boston and Cincinnati, responded immediately to the day-center fire by dispatching triage teams to Hermosillo.
“It is a circumstance where more than one Shrine team is called upon to provide support in a disaster,” said Lake Chapala Shrine Club President Noble Perry King, “The communication and collaboration among Shrine team members from various places, each with a unique and expert perspective, brought some succor and good medicine to the little victims of this event.”
The Shrine is a fraternal charity organization of men in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Panama, who are all Master Masons. It operates 22 hospitals that provide free treatment for children needing orthopedic or burn care. Three of those hospitals, in Cincinnati, Boston and Sacramento, specialize in burn care. Unfortunately, the burn care hospital in Galveston, Texas was so badly damaged by a hurricane that it had to be closed. The largest hospital in the Shrine system in Mexico City specializes in the treatment of children with orthopedic or cleft palette problems.
Last year, the Lake Chapala Shrine Club paid for 89 patient trips for a child (and his or her parents) for free treatment at the Mexico City Shrine Hospital Those who would like to assist in the Shrine program for medical treatment for Lakeside children should contact Perry King at pking1931@gmail.com.
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