This is not another day at work.
In November 2024, members of Endeavor Health’s orthopaedic team traveled to Nepal on a medical mission with Operation Walk Chicago.
Ravi Bashyal, MD, orthopaedic surgeon with Endeavor Health, is an active volunteer and board member with Operation Walk Chicago, a charitable organization that provides free hip and knee replacements to needy patients in developing countries around the world.
Operation Walk Chicago was founded by Drs. David Stulberg and Victoria Brander in 2005. Dr. Bashyal has led the work of this group at Nepal Orthopaedic Hospital (NOH) in Kathmandu, Nepal.
While the trip had a life-changing impact on the patients the team cared for, the experience was also life-changing for the medical team that included Jason Mitchell, MD, anesthesiologist with Endeavor Health, and orthopaedic surgery fellows, Nathaniel Koutlas, MD, and Gregory Schneider, MD.
“I think the difference here is going up to the floors, seeing the physical therapists up there, which is part of medicine that I don’t really ever see,” said Dr. Mitchell. “Seeing the families and seeing the patients getting up and walking and it’s just, it’s very heartwarming. It’s really gratifying.”
On this trip, one of the patients Dr. Bashyal cared for was a 24-year-old in severe pain with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, whose left knee was basically unbendable, and the other knee could not bend more than 90 degrees. Post-surgery, after a double knee replacement, he noted how she was now able to walk, sit and function with a healthy range of motion without pain.
“We do a lot of joints back home at our hospital in Skokie, and we have all of the most advanced technology available to do that,” said Dr. Schneider, who was on his first medical mission. “We’re here now in Nepal, we have much more limited resources. From a training perspective, it’s very valuable to learn how to do the same things in different places with different tools.”
"Being able to provide these life-altering surgeries to these underserved people here has been just an outstanding experience and something that is life-changing,” Dr. Koutlas said.
“This has been very eye-opening,” Dr. Schneider said. “I’ve gotten my exposure to this now and I think I’m going to want to be a part of this in some degree for the rest of my career.”
