Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, 14 September 2016: Family Medical Practice, Vietnam’s leading international health care provider this week sent a troupe of 26 doctors, 19 nurses and 61 support staff all keen to lend a hand in impoverished villages in Vietnam’s central highland province of Kon Tum.

In conjunction with the Embassy of Israel, the FMP team set up base in Mang Den, and dispatched 10 teams of doctors, nurses and helpers headed out daily to small and remote minority communities around the province, where the medical team performed health checks and a wide variety of other treatments.

The doctors are seeing over 10,000 patients in total across the week.  Doctors visited patients in Commune People’s Committee and medical stations in Mang But, Hieu, Po E, Mang Canh, Dak Ring, Dak Nen – Tu Ret, Dak Long,  Dak Tang, Ngok Tem communes.  The doctors also visited families and patients at their houses.

Family Medical Practice Vietnam’s CEO and Founder, Dr. Rafi Kot said of the expedition: “In over 28 years in Vietnam, this may be the most ambitious and logistically challenging project that I have ever undertaken.  Kon Plong is one of the five poorest districts in the entire nation, yet its population are incredible.  They are completely isolated from the rest of the nation, separated by poor roads (and often no roads) to the rest of the country, yet have been some of the warmest, friendliest people we could ever hope to meet.  Despite all the challenges brought on by infrastructure, unwelcoming weather, and tough terrain, we have so far been able to successfully execute our plan on schedule.  We treated over 2700 patients on the first day alone, and with so much left to do, we will continue to tackle the challenges ahead of us.”

Part of the medical crew in the remote central province is Pediatrician Dr.  Jonathon Halevy, who remarked: “It has been an amazing experience and we are doing incredible work against all odds!  I am seeing hundreds of patients every day – both children and adults. We are all seeing terrible cases of malnutrition, parasite infections, trauma and tuberculosis.  We have even seen babies with thalassemia, and another baby with a severe congenital heart disease.  Some terrible, terrible conditions, and in the case of the baby with the heart condition, I am going to bring him back to Ho Chi Minh City with me for a desperately needed surgery.”

His colleague, Dr. Claudio Duek concurred, after completing four surgeries back-to-back in a single day, he said of the experience: “We have been performing surgery under very trying conditions, but thankfully to satisfactory results.  The people up here have been absolutely wonderful, but the conditions of the hospital have been very poor.  They have almost nothing.  It’s very sad that in countryside this beautiful we see people in such need.”

Dr. Kot and the crew were accompanied by three container trucks full of 35 tons of rice, 3.5 tons of salt, 4 tons of clothes, foodstuffs, medicines and other donations following a public appeal over a month ago.  This was portioned into 3,500 care-packages and distributed to villagers.

Dr. Rafi Kot also donated an ultrasound machine worth over US$70,000 to the Medical Station of Kon Plong District.  The Embassy of Israel additionally dug wells to serve the local commune and kindergarten in the Hieu commune and repainted the Mang But secondary school.

This is the third time that the company has conducted this kind of humanitarian mission and the second time in the highlands of Vietnam. The team also visited Quang Binh in the past.

The week-long expedition kicked off on Monday morning and will continue till the end of this week.

———————————————————-Family Medical Practice, the first foreign-operated, multi-disciplinary medical provider in Vietnam, opened in Hanoi in 1994 and owns and operates five modern clinics based in Hanoi, Danang and HCMC. FMP is the only private medical provider in Vietnam with such national coverage. All Family Medical Practice clinics have fully equipped ambulances described as “state-of-the-art emergency medical units” on stand-by 24 hours a day.