Local Oral Surgeon Travels to Honduras on a Surgical Mission

ORMOND BEACH, Fla. - April 14, 2014 - PRLog -- Contact: Cindy Hate
386-445-0555
cmhate@cypressoral.com

Ormond Beach, FL – Cypress Point Oral Surgery and Dental Implant owner Dr. Sameer Haté, had the opportunity to travel to San Pedro Sula, Honduras on a surgical mission earlier this year to perform nearly forty surgeries with two other oral surgeons and two oral surgery residents from Tufts University and Christian Care Hospital.

The team, known as la brigade by locals, performed surgeries on the residents of San Pedro Sula ranging from approximately eight to 80 years of age.  The team operated on head and neck tumors, cleft lips and palates, deformities as a result of gunshot and machete wounds, and reconstructed missing lower jaws and even tongues.  They also had the opportunity to perform cosmetic procedures on patients born with facial deformities.  The team worked out of Ruth Paz Hospital for Burns and Surgery in San Pedro Sula.  Though it was a working hospital, most of all their instruments and equipment were donated by medical centers in the United States.  Often times, the team had to improvise using other equipment originally intended for orthopedic, plastic and even heart surgery.

The brigade worked 10 to 12 hour days and triaged nearly one hundred patients before selecting the forty who underwent surgery.  The others will be placed on a waiting list until another brigade returns in June.  Often times there were two operating tables going at the same time in the same operating room, as one person was having surgery the patient across the room was either recovering or was being prepped for their operation.

Dr. Roderick Lewin of New Hampshire, began the mission trips over 30 years ago.  Dr. Lewin who is now in his 80’s, is still active in administration and manages the trip at least twice a year.  The surgeons were accompanied by anesthesiologists and nurse anesthetists, from the United States and Honduras.

The other attending surgeons were Dr. Maria Papageorge who was Dr. Haté’s program director at Tufts and is also the Chair of the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery at Tufts Medical Center.  The team was rounded off by seven-year-veteran Dr. Patrick Abbey of Tampa.  Dr. Abbey and his wife, take time away from their two children and busy private practice to assist with the brigade at least once a year.

Dr. Haté feels very privileged to have been given the opportunity to take part in such a program.  He believes trips like this make him appreciate what we have here in the United States and how fortunate we are.  He hopes the lessons he has learned will carry him forward in his pursuit to providing the highest level of oral and maxillofacial surgical care to the patients of North Central Florida through both his Palm Coast and Ormond Beach office.

Cypress Point Oral Surgery offers dental extractions, nonsurgical sleep appliances, bone grafting, preprosthetic surgery, facial trauma treatment, oral pathology services, TMD/craniofacial pain treatment, corrective jaw surgery (orthognathic surgery) and more. They also utilize the most modern monitoring equipment and methods during intravenous sedation and general anesthesia, all while providing the highest level of oral and maxillofacial surgery care available. Each patient is treated with the attention and professionalism they deserve.  Both offices strive to work hand-in-hand with their referring doctors to be more than just a specialty office, but an extension of their own practices.

The two locations are: 105 Cypress Point Pkwy, Suite B, Palm Coast, and 198 Vining Court, Ormond Beach (the street behind CVS and LuLu’s Oceanside Grille). The offices can be reached at: Palm Coast - 386-445-0555, and Ormond Beach – 386-492-6801, or online at www.cypresspointoralsurgery.com or https://www.facebook.com/CypressPointOralSurgery.