Dr Marc Sinclair was 17 and in high school when he volunteered to work in a nursing home for the elderly for a few weeks. His job involved looking after the elderly, caring for the invalids, helping them move around... The work was not easy but extremely fulfilling, he recalls.
"I kind of liked the idea of being needed… of being able to care for and help others,'' he says. That same year he made up his mind: he would pursue medicine as his career.
Dr Sinclair was born in Brussels to an Australian father and a German mother. "My father taught me the value of listening to others, no matter who they are or where they hail from and of trying to understand their different lifestyles,'' he says.
His father also stressed the importance of persistence and taught him a lesson to drive home the point: "If you are on your way to your destination and come across a closed door, do not stop and turn away,'' he told young Sinclair. "Turn the knob… the door might not be locked.''
It's a lesson Sinclair remembers whenever he hits a hurdle. "I never give up or abandon a well-thought-out plan."
He studied at the University of Tübingen, one of Germany's oldest universities, and worked in various hospitals in Germany and Switzerland. "In Switzerland, I finally made up my mind to go ahead with paediatric orthopaedics after having been immersed in a very encouraging academic environment and seeing many severely affected children for the first time."
So what led him to set up The Little Wings Foundation?
"When one's ambition to make it big is set higher than one's purpose, some people make sacrifices and abandon their dreams of making a difference in the world,'' says Dr Sinclair, who now works at the Medcare Hospital in Dubai.
But all through his studies and in the course of his career, Sinclair was reluctant to abandon his dream of starting a foundation. "There's no fun in wondering - am I going be Head of the Department? For me, it didn't really matter. I had a different goal in life,'' he says.
In 2004, he had a chance to work for a month as a locum at the Shaikh Khalifa Hospital in Abu Dhabi. His family joined him here and they too developed a liking for the UAE.
He later worked as a consultant paediatric orthopedic surgeon for the Dubai Bone and Joint Centre from 2006 to 2008.
It was around this time that he came across several children who were suffering from severe bone deformities. It set him thinking and the plan to set up a foundation which could help treat children with musculoskeletal conditions began to take shape.
The stigma of physical deformity
"Limb deformities are almost as bad as being blind,'' he says. "Children suffering from such conditions risk being ostracised by society and are often viewed as "unlucky." The comparison to blindness is to drive home the point that both conditions - limb defects and blindness - lead to a life of isolation, given the fact that [many such children] cannot go to school and receive education or participate and interact with their social environment. For both conditions, a cure means more than just recovering the eyesight or function of a limb, but the reintegration of the child into society - with all its challenges and opportunities.''
Wings of hope
The Little Wings Foundation, a UK registered charity, was established in 2007 by Dr Marc Sinclair with one mission: to give back to the child the freedom he/she ‘lost' because of physical, economic and perceived social barriers. The freedom to hope; the freedom to dream; the freedom to live… to be a child.
The Little Wings Foundation has opened its doors to families in the Mena region who cannot afford the treatment and care necessary to correct bone malformations, congenital bone deformities or acquired bone-related injuries in children. Case in point: Elham, a one-and-a-half year-old girl from Gaza suffering from a bilateral dislocation of the hip, has been partly successfully operated upon at the Medcare Hospital. With the help of PCRF (Palestinian Children's Relief Fund), Elham was transported to Dubai from the Gaza Strip with her grandmother for a series of treatments to help her become completely mobile.
With the objective to give back any lost life opportunities to children suffering from such physical disabilities, the Foundation, headed by Dr Sinclair and supported by a host of dedicated volunteers, specialist doctors, nurses, social workers, donors, institutions, partner NGOs/movements among others, has taken it upon itself to help children regain their future.
Why children?
Because children have always been perceived as the hope of the future, he says. "We take care to ensure that we feed, clothe, protect and educate our children to make sure they get the same (or almost equal) opportunities as everyone else in the society.
"The earlier the condition is diagnosed and treated, the greater would be the likelihood of full recovery from the physical handicap.
"Why only children? ‘Because I like being around kids,'' he says. "They are honest and spontaneous. Most of the time, especially with the younger ones, they do not even sense the hopelessness other people seem to see in them. Their needs are simple. And even if they have one of the worst cases, all you have to do is tell them that everything is going to be alright and that they will be able to walk again, stand tall, hold a pencil or a spoon, hug their toys and [you see hope] in their eyes.''
Partner institutions and activities
The Little Wings Foundation has, in partnership with the Al Ain Oasis Hospital (a Cure International facility), pledged to treat children with musculoskeletal deformities in the UAE and neighbouring states.
In 2009, in partnership with PCRF (Palestinian Children's Relief Fund), the foundation was able to undertake a series of treatments in the West Bank for children who have had limited access to good hospital care.
More complex cases like the one of a child named Baraa, who suffered from a complex spinal deformity, had to be treated in partnership with another institution - the University Children's Hospital (UKBB) in Basel, Switzerland. The cost of the treatment was shouldered by the university.
UKBB has an agreement with The Little Wings Foundation to operate upon one child per year, every Christmas, absolutely free of cost. Mohammad, a boy from Pakistan suffering from a severe deformity in both the arms and hands, was elected as the recipient of the ongoing agreement of The Little Wings Foundation with UKBB for 2010.
The response from recipients has been heartwarming. "Thank you so much for helping me and my family. Thank you for going to Al Ain and operating upon me free of charge, wrote Celine, an 8-year-old Filipino girl born with chronic cerebral palsy that has affected her legs. The cost of the surgery required to have her legs straightened was Dh50,000. Her family could not afford this amount so the Oasis Hospital in Al Ain subsidised the medical expenses and Dr. Marc Sinclair, along with the Little Wings Foundation surgical team, operated on her for free last 2009. She was in a cast for six weeks and had braces placed on her knees to rehabilitate the legs. She and her family have migrated to Canada as of summer 2010.
"I wish and pray that I will become a doctor like you so I too can help children in need,'' she wrote to him. The Little Wings Foundation has ongoing cases that require all forms of assistance. For instance, it is caring for a girl named Linethma who suffers from a congenital condition which has caused a non-healing fracture in her leg. She will require treatment and future surgical procedures. In Dubai, the Medcare Hospital has offered the foundation one desk space with Internet access. The One donated a big room in a warehouse in Al Quoz to serve as the foundation's storage facility."Our needs are very specific. We need surgery-related materials, specialist doctors for our missions... We also need a volunteer web designer to maintain our site," says Dr Sinclair. Organisations in Dubai like the American Women's Association have figured prominently in helping local cases. Many educational institutions too have greatly contributed.
Dr Sinclair remarks, "We feel that kids supporting causes for other children is a great way to help."
Making a difference
Who: Dr Marc Sinclair
What: Little Wings Foundation, Dubai
Why: To treat poor children with musculoskeletal deformities so that they lead a normal life
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For more on this...
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www.thelittlewingsfoundation.org
Lovely Claire D Cachuela is a Dubai-based freelancer
