UNITED NATIONS, March 10 (UPI) -- Two U.S. doctors who helped the United Nations perform 545 fistula operations during two weeks in Nigeria are calling for more volunteers.
"You talk about helping people, that was extraordinarily gratifying," Dr. William Meyer, of Tucson, Ariz., said Thursday, following his return from the Murtala Muhammad Specialist Hospital, in Kano.
Fistula, caused by difficult labor that usually results in the death of the baby, is a hole that forms between a woman's vagina and bladder or rectum.
The UNFPA estimates more than 2 million women suffer from the humiliation and discomfort of constantly smelling like urine and feces.
Meyer volunteered with Dr. Ambereen Sleemi, from New York and two British doctors to perform the surgeries and urged fellow surgeons to volunteer.
"I was impressed by how young a lot of these women are," Meyer said in a telephone interview. "Basically, their life has been taken away from them."
"When you get a chance to operate on this patients and cure their leakage you get a chance to give their lives back."
