News Release

HOSPITAL STAFF MEMBERS, RETIREES COMPLETE MISSION TRIP

Aug. 12, 2006 — The South American nation of Ecuador was home away from home last month for six UPMC Northwest staff members and two retirees. They were members of the Northwest Medical Mission Team, and they completed the group's fifth mission outreach to Ecuador's Andes Mountains.

Making the trip were hospital staff members Rina Anderson, Chris Balatine, Mary Jane Daugherty, Glenn Hamm, MD, William Hebda, MD, and Nancy Horne and retirees Mary Ann Kaminske and Cathy Coleman. Dr. Hebda's daughter Margaret also accompanied the local group, which was part of a 23-member Evangelism Task Force mission team that provided basic medical and dental services, medications, eye tests, and eyeglasses for about 1,000 persons (more than half of whom were children) in poor areas of the capital city of Quito.

Team members also were involved in Christian ministry activity and took part in a project known as Happy Feet that involves washing childrens' feet and outfitting them with new socks and shoes.

"My experience on the mission trip was awesome and very humbling. We had the opportunity to meet many men, women, and children who have next to nothing and yet are very happy people. They were very appreciative of all our generosity," Mrs. Anderson says.

"We saw lives touched, including our own," Dr. Hamm says. "We pray and trust that there will be some lasting impact on the lives of those with whom we came in contact."

Some members of the Northwest Medical Mission Team spent a week in Ecuador, which straddles the Equator, and the remaining team members were there two weeks.

The team later this year will begin raising money for its next trip that is planned for March 2008.