ECHO FOR GHANA; Korle Bu Teaching Hospital Accra, Ghana

Gift of Life North East Ohio funds ½ for an Echo Cardiogram for Ghana

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Gift of Life Northeast Ohio helped facilitate Dr. Fynn -Thompson’s (Pediatric Cardio Thoracic Surgeon at Boston Children’s Hospital) goal of helping the children born with congenital heart defects in his home country of Ghana.

Dr. Fynn-Thompson contacted Rob Raylman, CEO of Gift of Life International for possibilities of support. At the same time, Wisdom Addo, Rotary World Peace Fellow from Ghana, met Ken Fogle, Chair of Gift of Life North East Ohio at the Northeast Ohio Rotary District 6630 spring conference. Wisdom asked if GoL NEO could help reach out to the children in need from his home country. Calls were made and a first pilot was run last fall with additional help of long time Rotary friend Dr. Manny Tuffuor of the Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Tuffuor is also of Ghanian birth and had worked with Rotary for decades in improving health care services throughout his home country while working as an internal medicine and geriatric doctor here in Cleveland. 

This Fall Dr. Fynn-Thompson planned his travels to Ghana to conduct a pilot program to test the potential of using National Cardiothoracic Center at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra Ghana for future mission trips. These missions would focus on teaching, training and equipping the Ghanaian medical team to expand and improve their capacity to provide children heart surgeries. The goal is to increase the capabilities of the local teams in expanding the number of children served with success ratios similar to those experienced at Boston Children’s. Dr. Fynn-Thompson needed an Echo Cardio machine to properly diagnose and plan for each child’s surgery. Gift Of Life International assembled a coalition of various Gift of Life and Rotary Clubs from; Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey to partner and match the 50% funding provided Gift of Life Northeast Ohio to purchase and ship the Echo. This partnership of matching funds from Rotary and Gift of Life programs around the world has been the basis of our Gift of Life International global reach into 80 countries serving over 50,000 children. 

We look forward to adding Ghana to the Gift of Life Countries with the goal of assembling a fully staffed mission trip in the spring of 2025, as the first of many, supporting the service of Ghanaian medical teams in fixing the hearts of their own children within their home country. We are proud to have played a part in supporting Dr. Fynn-Thompson, Peace Fellow Wisdom Addo and Dr, Manny Tuffuor in their efforts to give back to their home country.