Israel faces rocket attacks, neighboring civil war and advanced weapon threats, which receive much news coverage.
In spite of this, the Hadassah Medical Organization, 101 years after its founding by American women, continues to support the humanitarian, life-saving medical care and research at the two Hadassah Hospitals in Jerusalem, where patients of diverse backgrounds are treated regardless of religion or ethnicity.
Palestinian Authority Minister of Health, Dr. Hani Abdeen, on his first visit to Hadassah Hospital, recently spent time with 8-year-old Sarah Ghanem, a Palestinian from the West Bank, who is a patient in the Pediatric Oncology-Hematology Department.
The department has been involved in collaborative efforts, training 60 Palestinian physicians and treating 20 to 30 of these children each year, to improve the care provided to Palestinian children with cancer.
Dr. Abdeen also visited Hadassah's newest building, the 19-story, 500-bed Sarah Wetsman Davidson Hospital Tower, opened in 2012. Five floors with 20 operating rooms have been built underground to protect patients from chemical warfare and terrorism. Members of Hadassah Capital District, the local chapter of 1,500 women, recently completed a region-wide campaign to furnish and equip rooms in the tower.
Hadassah's most recent medical breakthroughs include the discovery of the reason for life-threatening infections in infants that lead to bone marrow failure and the new test to predict the presence of the harmful BRCA mutation that can trigger breast cancer.
Israel's efforts through science, technology and medical organizations like Hadassah work to bring hope for a better world.
To learn more about Hadassah, go to http://www.hadassah.org/medicine.
Dorothy Ganz and Anne Rothenberg
co-presidents, Hadassah Capital District