Carilion Clinic neurosurgery team donates knowledge and resources to Nepal’s largest hospital

ROANOKE, Va. (WDBJ) - Carilion Clinic has recently celebrated bringing new technology and advancements to our hometowns. Now, the healthcare institution is sharing that knowledge with a hospital nearly 8,000 miles away.

It’s a partnership that has been years in the making.

A team of Carilion’s neurosurgeons and residents traveled to the other side of the world to share resources with Nepal’s largest hospital. This partnership means thousands of Nepalese citizens can get advanced treatments they otherwise would never have been able to.

Dr. Srijan Adhikari is a neurosurgeon resident at Carilion Clinic. Since he started his residency five years ago, Dr. Adhikari’s goal has been to help the Nepalese community by sharing medical knowledge.

“Being part of that revolution within neurosurgery in Nepal is a humbling experience,” Dr. Adhikari said. “They have neurosurgery there, but we wanted to be a bridge between the gaps that they had.”

Dr. Adhikari explained he wanted to help the community that raised him.

“I really grew up in a poor family and the hospital that we actually go into is the hospital that I would go to, and it’s a hospital that serves the poor community,” Dr. Adhikari said. “Going back to that hospital again in a different role, where I’m not a patient, I’m actually somebody who can provide care for the patients, that is a very humbling experience.”

Dr. Adhikari worked with Carilion’s vice chair of neurosurgery, Dr. Mark Witcher, to make the partnership a reality.

“We went last year and asked them what their needs were, how we can maybe help,” Dr. Witcher said. “They asked if we could bring over functional neurosurgery, which focuses on epilepsy and movement disorders.”

Dr. Mark Witcher’s team built a technique catalog for Bir Hospital in Kathmandu, Nepal, saw 100 patients and taught 60 Nepalese neurosurgeons new operative methods.

“[These] are techniques that the entire community would have never had access to,” Dr. Witcher said. “It offers an incredible amount of hope to the patients and offers an incredible new set of tools to the surgeons to be able to serve their patients.”

Nearly 8,000 miles away in Nepal, Dr. Rajiv Jah explained the partnership is a historic moment for his hospital.

“The biggest factor is that people now know that there is treatment,” Dr. Jah said. “The general population [sees] our hospital is hope for all the Nepalese people.”

Dr. Adhikari and Dr. Witcher plan to keep going back to Nepal as often as they can.

“That’s kind of my desire to go back and give back to the society that I grew up on,” Dr. Adhikari said.

The hospital in Nepal is now working with the Ministry of Health to make neurosurgery techniques more affordable for the Nepalese people.

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