Action for Education, Inc.

Dr. Marc Dyrzska has deep family ties to Ukraine and their war for freedom. When the invasion occurred last year he knew he must help in whatever way he could.

Marc, being a prominent Columbia University spine surgeon took it upon himself to set up a medical mission in April of 2023 to aid the children of Ukraine who desperately needed surgical intervention. A team of two, Marc and Brian Demboski traveled to Lviv and successfully operated on 10 children with progressive deformities at Saint Nicholas Children’s Hospital. We were graciously hosted and assisted by Dr. Maryan Orach, Dr. Mikhail Lovga and Dr. Maria Pavliuk.

We not only donated our time but also our own funds to help solve this gap of care for the children of Ukraine.

Scoliosis care in Ukraine is minimal even in peace time. Families must leave the country and pay out of pocket for surgery their children need. We heard many stories of families traveling then being denied surgery for their child once they arrived in another country. When the war to maintain Ukraine's freedom occured, fathers and brothers could no longer leave the country, straining medical possibilities even thinner. Our goal is not only to continue to provide free spinal deformity corrections, but also to equip and train existing Orthopedic and Neurosurgical teams to perform these procedures at a high level.

These procedures as you can imagine are extremely dangerous and complex. We need your assistance to afford medical equipment to donate and travel expenses to continue to train the healthcare workers and serve the children of Ukraine!

Many large corporations will match employee donations to registered 501(c)3 entities. Please check to see if your company is one of them!

A special thanks to Dr. Michael Mastroianni (PGY2 Columbia Orthopedics resident) and his nonprofit organization Action for Education (AcE) for help organizing our surgical team this year.

Action for Education (AcE) is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt nonprofit organization that works to create affordable, accessible, and sustainable opportunities for education and healthcare. Our mission is centered around relief and capacity building – we build tuition-free schools and provide comprehensive healthcare and research in underserved communities.

To date, our 100% volunteer organization has raised over $500,000 in donations to build a public school that teaches 300 students, a nursing school with over 30 students, and have treated 16,890 patients on 10 medical service trips thus far.

For more information:

https://www.action4education.org/