State eye doctors returning to region with a new mission

A team of Dean McGee Eye Institute doctors envisioned their upcoming China trip to include routine cataract operations and goodwill aplenty. But a massive earthquake in Sichuan province may have them instead treating crushed, lacerated and ruptured eyes and faces.

"We can help them in a time of need when they hurt so much,” said Dr. Brad Farris, a neuro-ophthalmologist. "We'll be addressing the needs of the poor with eye and facial traumas,” he said.

Large numbers of deaths mean even larger numbers of injuries in Sichuan province, he said.

"We can show them how much we love them, and how much we will care for them,” said Farris.

The eight-member group leaves Thursday for Beijing and then Chengdu, capital of the devastated Sichuan province where tens of thousands of deaths have been reported since Monday's earthquake.

The eye institute is in Oklahoma City. It also helps train students from the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.

In Chengdu, team members will work at a large province hospital that was not damaged. They'll work closely with Chinese eye specialists who need more training to help their large populations of patients with treatable eye problems that include cataracts, Farris said.

Then the team will head into the countryside with a mobile eye-surgery vehicle to become a disaster-relief unit, Farris said. He expects patients with injuries much like the ones he treated after the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing in 1995.

The group's interpreter will be Susan Wei. Several of her family members died in the earthquake, Farris said.

"This has been an emotional catastrophe. Everybody there is overwhelmed right now. It's unbelievable,” he said. "We're needed.”

Farris said he doesn't fear that Chinese government officials will impede the team's medical activities because they've had five previous trips to China.

"The Chinese are very gracious. To them, it's all about trust and relationships,” the eye doctor said.

The China trip is the sixth organized by Farris and involving Oklahoma City-based ophthalmologists and other eye doctors from across the country. The trip has been planned for more than a year, and it won't be canceled, officials said. The team returns June 1.

Other team members from Oklahoma City are Drs. Don Stone, Lloyd Hildebrand, Gene Chen, Matt Traynor and Scott Guess. Also part of the team are Dr. Bill Clifford from Garden City, Kan., and Dr. Paul Chen from San Francisco. Some family members of the team will make the trip, too.