Have you ever experienced reaching that point in life where you have begun to feel that with all of the benefits that have come your way, you should “give something back”? It may not happen to many of us, but it did happen to Dr Tom Flynn, a very successful neurosurgeon from Baton Rouge, LA, and it changed his life!
Looking back upon that very pivotal point in his practice career, one that occurred 9 years into his practice, Tom tells his story this way: “It was my physician's assistant who gave me the nudge as we were operating one busy afternoon. She suddenly suggested that we explore the possibility of going to some far away place like Thailand to share our neurosurgical skills with people who would otherwise not receive care.”
Dr Flynn is quick to say, “I might never have thought of taking such a bold step as leaving my practice to go half-way around the world to do neurosurgical operations under very suboptimal conditions. But it was different with my P.A., Esther Sahlberg, the daughter of Christian and Missionary Alliance missionaries with a solid commitment to reaching out to others with a helping hand.”
“Before long,” says Tom Flynn, “our team—consisting of me as the neurosurgeon, Esther as my assistant in caring for patients, my scrub nurse, Beverly Dinnel, and Esther's father as our guide and translator—left Baton Rouge to begin our short-term volunteer work in a series of rural hospitals in northeastern Thailand.”
Over the course of the next 2 years, Dr Flynn and his team of neurosurgical volunteers made several trips to Thailand, each lasting from 2 to 6 weeks, and then they began to focus their efforts on developing a neurosurgical department in a provincial hospital in the city Khon Kaen. Working alongside Dr Chaiwit Thanaphaisal, a young neurosurgeon who had just completed his training in Bangkok, they began to build a neurosurgical department.
“Our first cases were those dealing with head trauma in the various outlying hospitals, as well as in Khon Kaen,” recalls Flynn. “Head trauma is a very common problem in Thailand due to the abundance of motorcycles on the streets and roads and the fact that most of the drivers don't wear helmets. We found that the evaluation and treatment of head injury patients was a priority because of the time required for observation and postoperative care.”
Dr Flynn tells how the mentoring he and his team were able to give to Dr Thanaphaisal led to a very close friendship with him and to neurosurgical care being brought to very appreciative patients, who without their efforts, would not have had this level of care.
Through special arrangements made by Dr Flynn at The NeuroMedical Center in Baton Rouge, and with Dr David Kline in New Orleans, it became possible for Dr Thanaphaisal to come to the United States on several occasions for advanced training. Realizing the potential for “making a difference” in the level of neurosurgical care in Thailand by bringing other young neurosurgeons, neurologists, and surgical nurses to the United States for further training led to the funding of “fellowships” to underwrite resulting costs.
By 1988, Flynn had begun to do neurosurgical volunteer work on a regular basis in Vietnam, doing so through the auspices of Samaritan's Purse Canada, a Christian nongovernment relief organization. This work was centered primarily in Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, but neurosurgery work was also carried out in outlying district hospitals. On occasion, neurosurgeons and neurologists were also brought from Vietnam to the United States for additional study, as had been done with doctors from Thailand.
“Although head trauma was a major problem in Vietnam, as had been true in Thailand, it was the intracranial tumors of heroic proportions presented to us that constituted the greatest challenge, especially in view of our having to use 1950s technology in dealing with them.”
As Dr. Flynn expanded his work in the Far East, he expanded his vision as well, and working again in concert with Samaritan's Purse, he began to take groups of medical students and doctors from Canada to experience the needs for medical care in Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos.
Remarkable as Tom Flynn's volunteer work had been up to that point, his efforts did not stop there, and while working in Srinagarind Hospital in Khon Kaen, he met a young doctor from Laos who aspired to be trained in neurosurgery. With funding support from The Southeast Asia Medical Aid and Teaching Fund, a foundation established through the efforts of Dr Flynn, this young physician was not only able to become a trained neurosurgeon, but to go as the first neurosurgeon in that entire country.
It has been 22 years since, while closing a case, Dr Flynn's P.A. observed how abundantly blessed we all are in the United States and suggested it would be good to find a way to give something back. And over the course of these past 22 years, they have “given back” indeed! Yet in talking with Dr Flynn about his accomplishments and the accomplishments of those who have worked with him as volunteers, one immediately senses his true humility. (In fact, he was reluctant to agree to have his story told in Surgical Neurology until being convinced that through reading his story, others might make their own decision to give something back through neurosurgical volunteerism.)
In Thailand and in Vietnam, countless people know the name Dr Thomas Flynn as a highly talented, loving, deeply caring, and compassionate neurosurgeon from America, who is on a mission to “make a difference” in the lives of others. At Khon Kaen University in Thailand, he has been given a faculty appointment, and the Royal College of Surgeons of Thailand has conferred membership upon him. Even Her Majesty, Queen Sirikit of Thailand, has acknowledged the contribution he has made to her country as a volunteer neurosurgeon.
Still, with heartfelt humility, Dr Flynn immediately turns the conversation away from any compliments, accolades, or honors by saying, “Having worked as a volunteer for so many years in these developing countries, I am convinced of the ongoing need for others from our specialty, and from all specialties of medicine, to think seriously about giving of their time and talents in helping to bring medical and surgical care to people who will otherwise never receive it.”
P.A. Sahlberg had it right when she said to Dr Flynn all those years ago, “As abundantly blessed as you and I and those around us are, don't you think the time has come to give something back?” And Dr Flynn had it right when he responded to her suggestion by saying, “Yes, let's do it! Let's see where we can go as volunteers. Let's go someplace where the needs are great. A place where we will be able to truly make a difference!”
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