What We Treat
Heart Healers International is a non-profit organization in African countries bringing life-saving heart diagnostics and treatments to children. We also work alongside the local medical teams in caring for patients, conducting ongoing research, and providing education to ensure sustainability and success for the cardiac health of African children. We treat both Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD) and Congenital Heart Defects.
Rheumatic Heart Disease
Rheumatic Heart Disease (RHD) is a preventable cardiovascular disease, caused by untreated strep throat and is of epidemic proportion in many developing nations. Nearly 400,000 children and young adults die from RHD each year. This is a reality that we cannot and will not accept.
Congenital Heart Defects
Congenital heart defects are the most common birth defect, occurring in 1% of all children. With intervention (surgery or heart catheterization), many children born with heart problems have a normal life expectancy and quality of life. Without treatment, these children will become progressively sicker and are unlikely to survive into adulthood.
Where We Help
Uganda
Dr. Sable has visited Uganda over 40 times with medical missions to Mulago Hospital since 2003; this includes 18 open heart surgery and cardiac catheterization missions at the Uganda Heart Institute focused on skill transfer and sustainability.
The goals have been to perform heart surgery with the Ugandan medical team, diagnose children with heart disease, facilitate treatment of these children abroad when needed, conduct collaborative research to reduce the burden of Rheumatic Heart Disease, and, most importantly, build a sustainable cardiac surgery program in Uganda through education, skill transfer, donation of technology, patient care, and meetings with hospital and government officials.
Ongoing education and advancement of the cardiovascular program are critical to prevent the “brain drain” of young physicians and nurses who are being trained.
The Uganda Heart Institute has met many of the requirements to move forward, so our goal is to have a sustainable and independent heart surgery program within five years in Uganda. The way forward includes sponsoring up to four missions per year and the Ugandan heart surgery and catheterization teams performing, in between missions, at least ten procedures per week with advancing levels of complexity.
We also want to continue to collaborate to reduce the burden of Rheumatic Heart Disease and care for children abroad who have heart defects that cannot be treated in Uganda.
Morocco
There are an estimated 4,000 – 5,000 children in Morocco in need of cardiac intervention. The heart surgery program in Marrakech, led by Professor Drissi Boumzebra has established itself as a beacon of hope for the children of Morocco and surrounding countries. It is our hope and expectation that we can continue our longstanding collaboration with Pr. Boumzebra and his team to help support the great work that they are carrying out.
We have built an association of charitable organizations to improve health care for the children of Morocco, focusing on collaborating with clinical teams in Rabat and Marrakech. In 2005, the Mosaic Foundation awarded the Children’s National Telemedicine program a grant to support the establishment of an international pediatric tele-education network between Children’s National and Morocco that has continued for almost 20 years. Intelsat has donated satellite dishes and time to support this work. Mrs. Felicia Mekouar, the wife of former Moroccan Ambassador Aziz Mekouar, was instrumental in securing this award and stewardship of its implementation.