The October 2024 mission brought pediatric hand surgery to two Ukrainian hospitals and included training for local surgeons—all amid ongoing war conditions.
In October 2024, University of Utah pediatric hand and plastic surgeon Shaun Mendenhall, MD, traveled to western Ukraine for a two-week medical mission, performing dozens of reconstructive surgeries on children with hand and extremity issues while navigating air alerts and missile threats that occasionally interrupted procedures.
During one such threat, he was in the middle of a reconstructive surgery. Mendenhall kept his cool. “You just have to continue operating. You can’t abandon a patient on the operating room table,” he says in a release. “Thankfully they were fairly distant threats and nothing that was immediately near where we were working.”
There were three air alerts, which typically require going to a bomb shelter, during his two-week stay in Ukraine, but overall, it was a quiet time for western Ukraine as far as a war goes. Mendenhall never thought we would enter a war zone for a mission trip, but he felt drawn to Ukraine. He also plans to go back this July if the war situation permits.
Collaboration with Ukrainian American Surgeon
Before coming back to U of U Health in July 2024, Mendenhall was at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where he worked closely with Oksana Jackson, MD. Jackson is a pediatric plastic surgeon specializing in facial reconstructive surgery for children. She is also a Ukrainian American.
Jackson has traveled to Ukraine many times in the past 15 years, both before and after the war started. While there are many children in Ukraine who need facial reconstruction surgery due to cleft lip and palates, there are also a lot of hand and extremity reconstructive needs.
“I started to hear more and more from Oksana while she was on her mission trips to Ukraine,” says Mendenhall in a release. “She was texting me with questions about hand and upper extremity patients who needed reconstructive surgery.”
Soon, another mission trip was in the works, one that would include Mendenhall and his expertise. The mission would focus on two regional children’s hospitals in Western Ukraine: one in a smaller town called Mukachevo and one in the larger city of Lviv.
Mendenhall and Jackson got letters from the directors of each hospital, inviting them, along with their teams, to come. The letters also outlined what the mission would entail and assisted in getting the team across the border for the mission.
In the six months leading up to the trip, Mendenhall and Jackson kept in close contact with surgeons and doctors in Mukachevo and Lviv. “Any time they had a patient who came in needing our expertise, they would send us photos and some background information on that patient,” says Mendenhall in a release.
The patients who were ready for treatment were added to Mendenhall’s consultation list. Some patients would need more testing before treatment, so they were added to a list for future missions.
Community Support Enables Expanded Surgical Mission
While Jackson and her team had traveled to Ukraine many times before, this was the first time they had a surgeon dedicated to pediatric hand and extremity surgery. Because of this, they needed more supplies and equipment than before.
One company donated 12 nerve stimulator devices, another loaned a portable x-ray machine, and another donated about $60,000 worth of artificial skin to be used for scars, wounds, and burns.
“We just had this outpouring of support,” says Mendenhall in a release. “The U supported me tremendously as well, making it possible for me to take time away from my normal duties and call duties while I was in Ukraine.”
Both Mendenhall and Jackson held fundraisers to help pay for the trip. Mendenhall also reached out to the American Society for Surgery of the Hand, Touching Hands Project.
“They donated $5,000 towards trip expenses, instruments, travel, and anything else we needed for the mission,” says Mendenhall in a release. The local community in Mendenhall’s neighborhood also donated over $12,000 to support the mission.
The prep work culminated in a successful two-week mission. Mendenhall spent the first week at Zakarpattia Oblast Children’s Hospital in Mukachevo and the second week at Saint Nicholas Children’s Hospital in Lviv. Mendenhall and his two pediatric plastic surgery partners saw about 130 patients in total and operated on 52 patients.
Training Local Surgeons
Everyone worked all day and into most evenings, trying to help as many children as possible. But the patients weren’t the only focus of the mission, the local surgeons were too. The surgical training in Ukraine is vastly different from that in the United States. After medical school, future surgeons complete a residency program in a primary surgical specialty in about three years, and then they are often on their own if they want to specialize.
“They don’t have the subspecialty training that we have here,” says Mendenhall in a release. “Plastic surgery training programs don’t exist in Ukraine. To become a plastic surgeon in Ukraine, you have to seek out your own training, often abroad, but this is not possible during the war due to travel restrictions. Hand surgery training is also extremely limited in Ukraine.”
Local surgeons drove across Ukraine to Mukachevo and Lviv to observe and sometimes assist with the surgeries. Mendenhall, Jackson, and their teams also gave lectures and led microsurgical training using chicken thighs. “It just makes me so grateful for what we have, on multiple levels,” says Mendenhall in a release.
His goal is to return to Ukraine for a mission trip at least once a year, if funding and the war permit.
“I was so inspired by the people of Ukraine, patients, parents, and providers alike, and their determination, their hope for peace, and willingness to learn and to serve. They were such good examples to me,” he says in a release.
