Donate Your Medical Textbooks!
Liana Hwang, a medical student who blogs over at Medvalleyhigh has started a program to re-populate a medical library that was destroyed in the tsunami. Please donate your books! She writes:
I recently returned from an unofficial medical elective with Dr. Azharuddin, the sole orthopedic surgeon in Aceh province (population 4.5 million), Indonesia. He works at a government hospital in Banda Aceh, which is the capital of Aceh province and was the city closest to the epicenter of the earthquake of December 26, 2004. Much of the city was affected by the tsunami, and the hospital in particular was virtually gutted, resulting in significant loss of equipment and staff.
Prior to my arrival, he emailed me to ask me if I could bring him a power drill as he was using a hand drill for all of his cases. I was eventually able to get a drill for the hospital by fundraising and subsidies from Stryker (an orthopedic instruments company). It turns out that power tools are not the only thing they’re short of in Banda Aceh. Although the international response to the tsunami has been great, there are still substantial shortages of equipment and supplies. In particular, I was especially moved by a medical student who showed me a waterstained, creased dermatology book from 1996. He told me it was his most prized possession, and although he was probably half-joking, it underscores the shortage of medical textbooks in Banda Aceh. The medical school is up and running again, but the students need books.
I left some books with Dr. Azharuddin when I departed, and then started collecting books from graduating medical students to donate to the medical school in Banda Aceh. To date, we’ve sent almost $1,200 of books to Banda Aceh. At the present time, Tulane, University of Calgary and Stanford are involved in this project. I’d like to see many more medical schools involved, as there is also great need for medical textbooks in East Timor, Myanmar, the Philippines, and other countries. They need basic level medical textbooks in good condition… Netter’s, physiology textbooks, etc. If you’re interested in donating textbooks, funds or time to this project, please contact me at [email protected] For more information, please visit my blog at http://medvalleyhigh.blogspot.com/2006/09/update-on-banda-aceh-fundraiser.html