Holding two large duffel bags full of surgical supplies, Dr. Martinez stepped onto a plane headed to the Dominican Republic. She was met by Dr. Carlos Gomez, a physician with more than 30 years’ experience, who leads Cataract and Anterior Segment Surgery at Elías Santana Hospital in Santo Domingo. Supplies were donated by Surgical Eye Expeditions (SEE) International and Alcon. Surgery was performed using a technique called manual small-incision cataract surgery (MSICS), commonly employed in resource-limited settings because it does not require the expensive machine normally used in cataract surgery to emulsify the eye's internal lens using an ultrasonic probe and aspiration.
After Dr. Martinez observed Dr. Gomez perform several surgeries, she began to participate by creating scleral tunnel incisions on subsequent cases. She ultimately performed about half of the MSICS surgeries independently. Together they performed 32 cataract surgeries in 2 days.
“We traveled two hours from the capital to a small mountain town called Cotui.
My husband grew up in a different rural town about 30 minutes away and it was an
incredible learning experience that also directly benefited the local community.”
- Dr. Christine Martinez
She looks forward to using her skills and experience to help restore vision loss from
cataracts and educate local providers in global communities in the future.