Care and surgery
Training and skills transfer
Building and equipping hospitals
Prevention and screening
Emergencies and humanitarian crises
Maternal health
Africa: 20 years of action
From the transfer of children to the transfer of skills: in 1989, the first two sick children transferred to France by Chaîne de l'Espoir to be saved were African, and over the past 20 years, 4 out of 5 children transferred to France for treatment have come from Africa.
More than 2,000 children have been treated in the last two decades, with a further 100 to 200 children operated on directly in Africa by La Chaîne de l’Espoir teams.
Since its foundation in 1988, La Chaîne de l’Espoir has worked tirelessly to develop cardiology and cardiac surgery in Africa – more specifically in the paediatric field.
While the company’s humanitarian missions in Africa focus particularly onWest Africa (Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Congo, Ivory Coast, Mali, Morocco, Senegal and Togo), it also cooperates with other countries on the continent, such as Ethiopia, Gabon, Madagascar and Somalia.
As early as 1989, La Chaîne de l’Espoir developed a network of doctors to detect children suffering from serious heart disease who needed to be transferred to France to undergo surgery and be saved. However, aware that transferring children to France can only be a one-off response, and convinced of the need for African countries to take care of their own patients, La Chaîne de l’Espoir has always given prime importance to training medical and paramedical teams.
In collaboration with local teams, La Chaîne de l’Espoir is directly involved in the field in the form of medical and/or surgical missions combined with training programs. It also contributes its expertise to the creation of specialized structures (the Maputo Heart Institute, in Mozambique) and the equipping of existing centers (the Fann Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery Center, in Senegal, and the Humanitarian Cardio-pediatric Institute in Casablanca, Morocco).
Through this program, we are helping to develop local medical techniques and approaches. In this way, we are helping to train local doctors to reduce maternal and infant mortality, which is common in the countries where we operate.
1000 children operated on in 3 years
Operation 1,000 Hearts has a clear objective: to save 1,000 children with congenital and rheumatic heart disease over the next three years by operating on them at the Fann Centre in Dakar and the Abidjan Heart Institute.
The operation, open to sick children not only from Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire but also from neighboring countries (Burkina Faso, Mali, Togo), will create a network dynamic between medical teams in the sub-region, facilitating the harmonization and systematization of procedures for the detention, care and follow-up of children with heart disease.
At the same time, La Chaîne de l’Espoir will be setting up university training and skills development programs in pediatric surgery, echocardiography and cardiac surgery, in partnership with the Dakar Faculty of Medicine, the Abidjan Faculty of Medicine and the Paris V Faculty of Medicine.
These training courses, open to all West African practitioners (general practitioners, pediatricians, cardiac surgeons, interns, etc.), will last between one and two years, and will culminate in an inter-university diploma awarded by the partner faculties.
La Chaîne de l’Espoir will thus be able, in line with its multi-decennial actions, to combine the care of children in peril with the training of local experts to create a life-saving dynamic for these unjustly condemned children.
Abidjan: high hopes for medicine
The unrest in Côte d’Ivoire following the presidential elections in December 2010 forced La Chaîne de l’Espoir to suspend its cooperation with the Abidjan Heart Institute.
In 2012, the geopolitical situation is stabilizing, allowing La Chaîne de l’Espoir to resume its activities in Abidjan.
The first cardiac surgery mission is scheduled for 2012. A team from Nantes will be on site to operate on children and provide training sessions.
Cooperation with the Abidjan Heart Institute is vital for La Chaîne de l’Espoir and the development of its pan-African projects.
The resumption of surgical activity at the Institute is essential to maintaining the quality of care and treating sick children in the West African sub-region. Cooperation with the Institute will also enable us to maintain the high level of performance in the training of practitioners.
Senegal: a benchmark for Africa
Since 1989, La Chaîne de l’Espoir has been transferring Senegalese children suffering from cardiovascular pathologies to France for treatment.
A cooperation agreement signed in 2000 formalizes the surgical missions carried out by La Chaîne de l’Espoir at the Le Dantec hospital in Dakar.
The growing need for cardiovascular care and the technical difficulties encountered have prompted La Chaîne de l’Espoir to consider the creation of a new structure dedicated to cardiovascular surgery, with its own consultation, intervention, resuscitation and hospitalization facilities.
Opened in 2004, the Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery Center at Fann Hospital was built on the initiative of the French Ministry of Health. Fully equipped by La Chaîne de l’Espoir, it is directed by Professor Mouhamadou N’Diaye.
In 2008, a second building dedicated exclusively to consultations was added to this structure, which is fully adapted to cardiac surgery. The center’s cardiac surgery team was trained in France (Hôpital Européen Georges Pompidou, CHU de Clermont-Ferrand) and, since 2008, Senegalese medical-surgical teams have been operating autonomously throughout the year.
All nursing staff have benefited from specific training in cardiac surgery, developed by La Chaîne de l’Espoir, with theoretical courses and assisted hands-on practice. The Center has just opened a CES (Certificat d’Etudes Spéciales) in cardiac and thoracic surgery aimed at practitioners in West Africa.
In 2011, La Chaîne de l’Espoir organized its first pan-African mission, transferring heart children from Mali to Senegal. French and Senegalese teams operate on 6 children with heart problems. This first mission is a model of development for Africa.
Today, La Chaîne de l’Espoir, represented by Professor Alain Deloche, and the Bambini Cardiopatici Nel Mondo association, represented by Professor Alessandro Frigiola, are working with Professor Ibrahim Bara Diop, a cardiologist at Fann University Hospital and head of the project, to create a pediatric cardiology unit at Fann Hospital: the Institut du Cœur de l’Enfant.
Cameroon: aiming for a Heart Institute
La Chaîne de l’Espoir, in agreement with the country’s Ministry of Health, transfers children suffering from serious pathologies for surgery. To date, over a hundred children have benefited from this transfer.
La Chaine de l’Espoir and Dr Edwine Wawo, cardiologist at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Yaoundé, are working together on a project to build a Heart Institute in Yaoundé.
The institute would train local practitioners in modern cardiovascular surgery techniques and extend the range of care available in the country’s most densely populated central region.
A project to follow on this site.
“Congo is the country where I have lived through two essential stories in my career. The first is called Chancelle. It symbolizes a successful operation on a young patient with a heart defect. Today, she’s doing well: she’s the mother of two children, the eldest of whom is called Sarkozy. The second is unusual: in an interval of some twenty years, I operated on the heart of Father Jean-de-Dieu and then on his son, Divin.
Hundreds of children have been saved, and it’s gratifying to see old patients in the presence of new ones.
It’s abnormal that 40% of the doctors trained remain in the training country. It’s time for Africa to develop South-South medical cooperation with a university curriculum.”
