Editor’s note: AAHPO Board Member Vahe Tateosian, MD (photo at left) is in Armenia now, leading a Medical Mission staffed with anesthesiologists and surgeons from the medical center at State University of New York at Stony Brook. This mission took years to plan and coordinate, and AAHPO thanks Dr. Tateosian for his efforts! He will be sending photos and updates, which we will share with you. Below is Dr. Tateosian’s first submission, written before the Mission departed for Armenia.

I have been fortunate to create and organize a multidisciplinary team of both anesthesiologists and surgeons to come to Yerevan and work with our Armenian colleagues and health care professionals. For years, I have established a working relationship with the administration and faculty at Arabkir Medical University and have now invited subspecialists from the State University of New York at Stony Brook to create a bilateral dialogue and exchange of both ideas and practices. We will be conducting a medical/surgical mission of approximately 8-10 days which encompasses consultations, discussions as well as working together on a number of operations on children in Yerevan. One of our main objectives is to foster collaboration through building and maintaining professional relationships.

For our current mission, we will be consulting on and working together with our colleagues from Armenia on pediatric surgeries of many different subspecialties. We have been in contact with our Armenian physicians the preceding few months to discuss various cases and clinical scenarios prior to our trip abroad, and have made many introductions via video conference calls. We will also be providing a number of hands-on workshops on various topics as well have created a lecture series to provide them with didactic teaching while we are there. We hope to make this an educational experience for both the Armenians in Yerevan as well as Americans that are on the mission. For our American medical missionaries, it is a multifaceted experience. Most notably, it allows for not only an experience in international medicine, but also serves as an introduction to the health care system and culture of Armenia as well. The idea is to create a sustainable program that will have health care providers from both sides participate in education and training. I happen to be the only Armenian in the group and am leading a team of 5 non-Armenian health care specialists, which include a pediatric anesthesiologist, pediatric surgeon and 3 chief residents of anesthesiology.

Another connection to AAHPO’s continued support for health care professions in Armenia is the fact that we continue to train Fund for Armenia Relief (FAR) fellows from the various hospitals and region, which continue to participate in as many of the activities such as lecture and didactic teachings. This helps to serve as a bridge to the current and ongoing support of the AAHPO, Dr. Raffy Hovanessian Medical Education Program, which FAR helped to found, and is a current partner with AAHPO.