The death of our beloved President Dr. John Pombe Magufuli delayed the start of the mission for the week of national mourning and patients we expected to come for procedures could not travel. One child had significant pneumonia and had to be canceled.

As is typical when starting a new program there are many delays and troubleshooting and creative solutions learned over the years.

It took until 2:30 pm on the first day to start the first case. We had a contrast injector but it had never been used and it was missing a part. We had 1 transducer to measure pressures but it stopped working 2 months ago. Certain cases cannot be done without these things. In 3 days, we were able to do 3 successful cases. For the international team this seemed very underwhelming but to us Tanzania team who had been working for three years to make this happen – it was monumental giving us much hope for the future.

Two sick infants who were malnourished and had insignificant heart failure were able to have their heart defects fixed with very large devices.

The third infant had a Devine Appointment – came at the end of the day yesterday to have her heart evaluated but was also found to have a very large fluid collection around her heart and would have not survived more than a few days without a procedure. She was supposed to be seen in a clinic far away in a few days but the parents heard we were there and brought her to see us instead.

We were able to drain off all the fluid (even without the typical supplies) and she looked so much better. This could not have happened anywhere else. These were all firsts for them.

After completing all the procedures successfully, Dr. Mary Porisch, An Interventional Pediatric Cardiologist from the For Hearts and Souls Team said that;

Our heartfelt appreciation to the entire team for making such a memorable lifesaving mission. Thank you so much!