Last week I had the privilege of viewing three surgeries; moving from one operating theatre to another. It was amazing, not only to see what actually takes place, the skill and precision of each operation, but also amazing is how Mercy Ships works! In one operating theatre, there was a US surgeon, Ethiopian assisting surgeon, an Austrailian anesthesiologist, a British OR nurse, and a Swiss assisting nurse. All of them only on board for just a few days and never worked with each other before, came together to perform this delicate operation of separating the fingers of a little boy who had been burned from a cooking fire five years ago and his fingers had fused together on both hands. 
I watched the surgeon take pry open the fingers that had been contracted into an unuseable ball, carefully stretching the muscles & skin, clip the skin and graph more skin from the thigh of the boy. Then they drilled rods into the fingers to keep them straight for the healing process and, of course, many weeks of physical therapy. 
On to the next operating theatre where I was able to see a cataract removed. I was able to see everything on a large monitor in the OR. The surgeon deftly made an incision, scooped out the cataract (which hs a consistency like firm white rubber) then slid in a new lens, all of which took about 8 minutes! Apparently this procedure is rarely done in the US because the cataracts rarely get to the point of such severity and the western world uses laser technology to smash and dissolve, rather than cut and scoop! Nevertheless, this low tech method is extremely effective with these types of severe cataracts. It was a facinating day!
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