April 8, 2002

DONALD MEIER, director of surgical services at Children's Medical Center in Dallas and a member of Park Cities Baptist Church, hopes to lead a team of 10 surgeons--five pediatric and five adult--to Afghanistan to do what they can to alleviate "abysmal" medical conditions in the war-ravaged country.

Texas doctor explores needs for mission to Afghanistan
___By Toby Druin
___Editor Emeritus
___Sometime this summer, Donald Meier hopes to lead a team of 10 surgeons--five pediatric and five adult--to Afghanistan to do what they can to alleviate "abysmal" medical conditions in the war-ravaged country.
___The team, the first of many Meier would like to see make the trip, would spend a week there, working side-by-side with Afghan colleagues, making rounds and performing surgery and also teaching and lecturing on modern surgical methods.
___The Afghans would welcome it and are excited about the possibilities, said Meier, director of surgical services at Children's Medical Center in

DONALD MEIER poses with men and boys being helped through Baptist food aid in Afghanistan.

Dallas, and a veteran of 17 years of service as a Southern Baptist missionary surgeon in Nigeria before he resigned and came to Dallas in 1999.
___Meier is a member of Park Cities Baptist Church in Dallas and lately has been helping start a new congregation in the city.
___In January, Meier accompanied David Harding, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship's project coordinator for Afghan crisis response, and Jim Jennings, a consultant with Conscience International, on a trip to Afghanistan to assess what could be done there.
___Through a partnership with World Vision International, the CBF already has taken steps to minister to the Afghans through a $100,000 contribution to a food distribution and nutrition program that fed nearly 500,000 people in the western provinces. Jennings and Conscience International have been working in humanitarian relief in many counties in the area and in Iraq.
___"I went as a medical consultant," Meier said, "to see the need and to make recommendations for CBF as to what they realistically could do from a medical standpoint."
___Although much of his time was spent shuttling back and forth between government offices and hospitals to get permission to be in the medical facilities, Meier was able to perform surgery, make rounds with Afghan physicians and talk with many of them about their needs.
___"I was welcomed," he said. "They were all excited about the possibilities."
___He met with the chief of surgery at Indira Ghandi Children's Hospital in Kabul and spokewith residents training in pediatric surgery and asked how he and other American physicians could help.
___ "They were all excited and asked if we could do it in English," he said. "They speak a little English and want to develop their skill in English as well as surgery."
___Meier concluded the best way to help would be through medical education similar to a plan he has participated in with the Baptist Me

DONALD MEIER (second from right) assists Afghan doctors in a surgical procedure at Indira Ghandi Children's Hospital in Kabul during his recent visit there.

dical/Dental Fellowship in Albania.
___"A couple of times a year, a group of us go to Albania for a conference that includes three days of lecture in continuing medical education, and it has worked very effectively," he said.
___"I think that would be the best approach at this time in Afghanistan, taking medical specialists with supplies and teaching materials. They have a tremendous need for modern materials; their textbooks are from the 1940s. We could be there for a week, making rounds, giving lectures and operating with them--becoming a part of their system."
___Many medical personnel already have heard of his trip and what he has in mind and have begun to respond, Meier said.
___"I have heard from dozens of people, including former Vietnam paramedics, nursing professors and physicians. We have received $10,000 for the effort without having made any appeal. The medical center has set up a special fund for it."
___No specific plans have been made, and much work needs to be done before the first group can go, he said. There are no commercial flights into Kabul at present and no place to stay. He and Hardin and Jennings slept on cots in one small room in the home of a missionary family serving with International Assistance Mission.
___Nevertheless, Meier is interested in hearing from people involved in health-care education, particularly if they have developing world experience. Volunteers will have to pay their own expenses if selected for the trip. Meier may be contacted at dmeier@childmed.dallas.tx.us.
___His interest in Afghanistan began late last fall, he said, when he read a Dallas Morning News article on the bad condition of health care in the country.
___"I figured I had served my time in such situations in Nigeria," he said, "and I really didn't want to hear about the needs of the world. But when I saw that article, I realized I was as qualified as anyone. And my wife, Patsy, is an operating room nurse who assisted me greatly in Nigeria. We are as qualified as anybody, I thought."
___"To me," he added, "if you perceive a need and have the ability to fulfill it and the desire to do it, those are the components of a call from God."



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