Long Beach nonprofit brings heart surgery to Cambodian children

Top: A team of physicians and health professionals from California and Wisconsin volunteered their services to help 15 Cambodian children to receive heart surgeries during a recent medical mission to the country. The Long Beach nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries helped sponsor a team of physicians who performed procedures. Bottom: One of 15 Cambodian children to receive heart surgeries during a recent medical mission to the country.

By Greg Mellen Staff Writer
The Contra Costa Times
Posted: 02/01/2012

For the first time, Long Beach nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries was able to offer life-extending surgeries to destitute Cambodian children in their home country, rather than bringing them to the United States.

During a five-day medical mission, doctors from California and Wisconsin repaired the hearts of 15 children at Angkor Hospital for Children.

Peter Chhun, founder of the nonprofit who first began bringing children to the U.S. when the equipment for open-heart surgeries was not available in Cambodia, was delighted with the outcome.

"To come to the country of my birth and witness sick children before the surgery, and then to see them after the surgery, smiling, playing and not having the same blue color on their fingertips and lips is a great feeling," Chhun said. "I don't think I can find anything better than this to do."

For Hearts Without Boundaries, which has brought four children to the United States for surgeries over the last four years, the recent medical mission was a boon and proved to be a much more efficient way to treat the children.

Chhun said it is much more costly and time-consuming to bring one child at a time to the United States. By sponsoring the mission, in five days the number of children treated was more than three times what the nonprofit achieved in four years. And the cost was a modest $3,000 per child.

The added benefit is that during the missions, surgeons train Cambodian health professionals to one day be able to perform the surgeries.

A group of doctors that once performed minor heart repairs called PDAs has been able to discontinue because physicians at Angkor Hospital are now able to do them.

Chhun said recent research shows more than 100,000 children in Cambodia suffer from heart defects, with very few ever receiving treatment.

He hopes sponsors will be able to help his nonprofit continue to support missions either once or twice per year.
The Long Beach nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries helped sponsor a team of physicians who performed procedures on 15 Cambodian children, including this patient.

"This is a part of our mission now," Chhun said. "I would like to do more.

Chhun said some more serious cases would still be brought to the United States.

He said the mission had another benefit.

"This trip is more up close and personal," Chhun said. "To have been able to provide care to a child from my village is something I had never dreamed of. A long way from my village ... a long way to accomplish my goal."

greg.mellen@presstelegram.com, 562-714-2093, twitter.com/gregmellenpt