A spinal surgery for a child in Burundi was made possible by the coordination of Rotary members on multiple continents. The young girl, named Maïssa, had early-onset scoliosis, a curvature of the spine. A team of Belgian surgeons working in the country found that she was in urgent need of intervention. A local doctor was not available and her family could not afford to travel out of the country. So the doctors contacted Pierre De Vriendt, a member of the Rotary Club of Gand Maritime-Gent Haven with experience coordinating medical missions, to help recruit surgeons from India in hopes of finding a lower-cost option. Word of the girl’s need eventually reached Els Reynaers Kini of the Rotary Club of Mumbai Sobo, which supports the work of the Spine Foundation in India with the help of a Rotary Foundation global grant. In November, two doctors, Abhay Nene and Harshal Babulal Bamb, traveled at their own expense to Burundi, where they performed the first operation on Maïssa, now 6. Reynaers Kini, who intends to expand the medical work in Burundi, relays the gratitude of the girl’s mother, Martine Karabona: “Not only has Maïssa been given a new lease on life so she can grow into a confident woman, but along the way all of us have grown really close and are now truly one global family spread across India, Belgium and Burundi.”