Saving Thomas

$120 of $100,000 goal

Given by 3 generous donors in around 11 months

We are asking you to give a little to achieve a lot, to save the life of Thomas - a 6 year old boy on a remote island in Indonesia.

Auckland

As doctors we came across this Indonesian boy, with big searching eyes and what we think is a deformed heart from birth. He has been struggling for his whole short life of six years, for a breath. How could we not do something?

We were lucky to have Dr Caroline Meadows on board, a paediatrician from Northland. Her provisional diagnosis is congenital heart disease which is now causing heart failure. We estimate that without surgical intervention Thomas will die within 6 to 12 months. It could be a lot quicker if he gets an infection. You can see from the video how unwell he is but looking in his eyes he has hope.

Thomas has been through two hospitals on his way to get more medical specialist help, he has had two blood transfusions and sadly lost his mother through our journey to help him.

The doctor looking after Thomas has let us know we need a portable echocardiogram machine so that can diagnose heart conditions to take to Waisai Hospital and run a clinic, so we can help other children as well as Thomas. If you know someone or can help let us know. The good news is that Thomas is gaining weight, it is too difficult to get him to Jakarta now that his mother has died, so we need to get the machine to him, and also help diagnose other Children.

Thomas is still a long way of being able to live a normal life, he needs a lot more medical attention and we ask you to please donate to help us, help him.

Please check out this short video on Seven Sharp of Thomas:

http://tvnz.co.nz/seven-sharp/mercy-mission-video-6177694

Yours faithfully

Dr Tom Mulholland

Medical Director

www.exploremedical.net

Other page links

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Returning to try and save Thomas 16 March 2015

Dr Caroline Meadows and I are heading back to Waisai to try and save Thomas in April.

We will be heading to the village and thanks to the Generosity of Sonosite NZ, are taking an Ultrasound scanner to look at Thomas’s heart to see what structural problems there are, and if they can be fixed.

We will also be scanning the hearts of children in the area to see if we can pick up any other structural heart problems. We could not be doing this without the help of our sponsors, the Indonesian Health authorities and Drs Sririyanti Wijaya and Dr Syarif a Cardiologist from Jakarta.

If you could donate some money it will now go to Thomas and his family as his mother tragically passed away leaving 5 children.

Many thanks for your ongoing support.

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