Dutch Treat for Ghana
Children in Ghana crippled by polio almost always grow into adults crippled by polio. The country has only a handful of orthopedic surgeons, and its hospital's operating rooms are clogged with patients needing life-saving surgeries.

But thanks to Lions and LCIF, thousands of children with polio or other congenital deformities, as well as adults, will receive reconstructive or corrective orthopedic surgery. The Maastrict Lions Club in the Netherlands raised funds to construct an operating theatre at St. John of God Hospital in Duayaw-Nkwanta. Then LCIF provided a US$59,804 matching grant to the club to equip the theatre.

The funds purchased an operating table, anesthetic equipment, other equipment and training for current orthopedic surgeons, who had received their training abroad and were not experts on diseases endemic to West Africa.

The assistance by Lions and LCIF improved a dire situation. Only 2 percent of people with disabilities in Ghana have access to help. Most of those with disabilities are children.

St. John of God Hospital is the only hospital in northern Ghana to provide corrective orthopedic surgery. Only 250 such operations were done annually because of the hospital's limited facilities, which could handle 750 total surgeries each year. But thanks to the expanded facilities and additional training, the hospital now can handle 3,000 in-patients each year.

The hospital's orthopedic surgery program was initiated in 1988 by a Dutch physiotherapist, who directed a rehabilitation center in Ghana.

The LCIF grant for the equipment was an international assistance grant involving Lions of Netherlands and the Kumasi Royal Lions Club of Ghana. International assistance grants allow clubs from two nations to collaborate on a humanitarian project.