Nearly 100 years ago, our founder Ali’s grandfather helped build the Aliabad Teaching Hospital and Medical School in Kabul, Afghanistan, and his great uncle had served as its president, long before a 40-year war had ravaged the entire city. The hospital still stands today, untouched by the punishment that the country was subjected to by foreign powers and internal strife. While filming the third episode of ‘The Backpacking Doc’ documentary over one year ago, Ali visited the hospital to ascertain their needs and to learn about medicine in the nation of his birth to compare to the medicine he practiced back home in Washington D.C. The site was indescribable. Only two surgical suites, less than 10 emergency room beds, no capability for advanced cardiac, gastric, or transplant procedures, and an overflowing population of patients that outnumbered the physicians and nurses more than 20 to 1. The doctors and medical staff were properly trained but they were limited by lack of access to equipment and resources. Medications were present but shortages were common, in spite of adequate pharmacies in town, due to lack of funds. We quickly organized a fundraiser for the hospital in the course of a week and supplied nearly $10,000 worth of medical equipment and medications that they sorely needed at the time. But time has passed, medications run out, and equipment becomes old. We need to help them again, this time in a bigger way, by supplying equipment for the surgical suites, the emergency room, and state of the art equipment for advanced procedures so they can serve patients in need of acute emergency care. This will require grants and fundraising that numbers in the tens of thousands of dollars, but with proper mobilization it is possible. Better health equals better economy equals better country. Let’s start by saving who we can, and the country will save itself from the grips of war as a result.
