High-tech prosthetics for 75 Guatemalan amputees

Brandon's favorite toy and character is Spiderman and what he wants to do most (and what his mom wants him to be able to do most) is crawl and walk. 

ROMP believes that mobility is a concept that unites all human beings, regardless of geographic location or socioeconomic status, age or gender. To be mobile is key to all areas of a person’s life, especially in the healthy and happy start to a child’s life. Children living with amputation in resource-limited settings, such as Guatemala, must be mobile in order to attend school, make friends, play, and grow.

Disability, poverty, and vulnerability form a vicious cycle that affects people with amputations and their families. This cycle is amplified for those who become disabled in their youth or are born with a disability. People become immobile not by broken bodies, but by broken rehabilitation systems; not by missing limbs, but by missing prostheses. 

This understanding drives ROMP’s multifaceted approach:

Equalizing the distribution of prosthetic care by providing the highest-quality services to the most vulnerable people with disabilities in the Western Hemisphere.

Decentralizing care delivery onto the community level, and diversifying services to address needs and desires in health, education, livelihood, social, and empowerment categories.

Innovating new technologies, care delivery models, and financing mechanisms to continually achieve excellence and category leadership in the global rehabilitation community.

Raising public and political awareness for the drivers and effects of immobility and disability through public messaging and the creation of policies.

Enabling people with disabilities, especially children, to maximize their human mobility and unlock their full human potential through advocacy and recreation.

With all this in mind, this past October, we were able to give the gift of mobility to Brandon, who is just two years old. Thank you for making that possible! Please consider ROMP in your end of year giving plans. We woudl be so grateful, as would our patients like, Brandon.

Dear Supporters Of ROMP,

In the first half of 2017, ROMP undertook an ambitious remodeling project of its flagship clinic in Zacapa, Guatemala, where thousands of people with amputation have been delivered high-quality prosthetic care in the 12 years since its founding in 2005.

The plan for this remodeling was based upon a SWOT analysis and lean manufacturing assessment that was jointly conducted by ROMP-USA and ROMP-Guatemala at the beginning of 2017. In the months that followed, ROMP-Guatemala's Executive Director, Luis Aragón, led a large team of his staff, contractors, volunteers, and corporate sponsors in the execution of the remodeling plan. This included making improvements to the clinic’s ventilation and drainage; constructing new workbenches, tool boards, and a strap cabinet; implementing a new floor layout and organizing the inventory room; reworking the electrical system; increasing security; creating a waste-management system; and gardening in front of the clinic.

These functional and aesthetic changes have improved both the effectiveness of the ROMP-Guatemala clinical staff, and the experience for ROMP-Guatemala patients.They have charted a course of continual improvement for the clinic, and will impact the clinical care delivered to thousands of patients who are served there in the years to come.

None of this would have been possible without the support of contributors, like yourself. 

Thank you for helping to make this project a reality.

With Much Gratitude,

Your Friends At ROMP