Friends
of Danang
P.O. Box 1551
McMurray, PA 15317
Date published:
Thursday, August 26, 2004
By Scott Beveridge, Staff writer
PITTSBURGH – The Pittsburgh surgeons sent many patients home in tears, unable to mend their disfigured bodies in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
They had to tell patients suffering from grotesque pre-cancerous skin growths or cleft palates that their birth defects were so severe that plastic surgery was not an option.
"They walked out crying. It was the worst, turning them away," said Tara Burns, who accompanied the surgeons for three weeks in April as a student at Duquesne Univeristy, Pittsburgh.
The medical workers with Surgicorps International operated on 58 other patients with less-severe deformities, referring to them as numbers rather than names at Maxillo-Facial Hospital. Founded by Fox Chapel plastic surgeon Dr. Jack Demos, Surgicorps has provided physicians, nurses and other volunteers for surgery in more than two dozen Third World countries, using donated supplies.
Burns had no idea when she volunteered at school for overseas experience in plastic surgery that Vietnam would be her destination.
"When I heard Vietnam, it had kind of an emotional twist to go there 30 years after the war," said Burns, a physician assistant who has since graduated from Duquesne.
"One woman was jumped on the street and had battery acid dumped on her. My heart bled for some of these people," said Burns, 23, of Brookville, Jefferson County, who worked 14-hour days in the hospital.
Burns became the first student to earn college credits in Vietnam through her university's affiliation with a Washington County humanitarian organization.
The Friends of Danang of McMurray, founded by local Vietnam veterans, has been working to build a friendly relationship between Pittsburgh and Vietnam since 1998. The group has funded schools, a medical clinic and surgery for children in Danang.
Burns said experiencing Vietnam was probably more rewarding than going to France or Italy, popular destinations of college students in foreign studies programs.
"You're actually going over there and affecting people's lives. That's better than seeing a painting in a museum," she said.
A founder of the Friends of Danang, Anthony W. Accamando Jr. of Eighty Four, introduced Duquesne to Surgicorps. He also put Duquesne – his alma mater – in touch with the State University of New York-Brockport, which operates the only year-round college for U.S. students in Vietnam. American students have been spending semesters in Danang since 2000, attending lectures in Vietnamese language, culture and history, as well as performing community service.
"When (Accamando) told us about all of his endeavors, I latched on," said Jill Dishart, Duquesne's assistant director of international programs.
"He definitely is an altruistic pied piper," Dishart said. "He certainly gave us an opportunity to do good."
The SUNY-Brockport project has been slow to attract students from Duquesne because of the stigma attached to Vietnam after the war, Dishart said. The university has established a scholarship for Vietnamese students because of its connections to Vietnam and the Friends of Danang. The first Vietnamese scholarship recipient arrived at Duquesne this month.
Surgicorps will return next year to Ho Chi Minh City, Demos said, and seek to provide surgery in Danang, at the request of Accamando and his friends.
"You're looking at the ripple effects of the Friends of Danang," said George D'Angelo of Eighty Four, another founder of the organization.
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