CHICAGO—Earlier this evening, a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) was recognized for his selfless efforts as a volunteer surgeon to the medically underserved population of Nigeria by being honored with the 2006 Surgical Volunteerism Award of the College and the Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative (PMHI). John L. Tarpley, MD, FACS, FWACS, a general surgeon from Nashville, TN, who is the program director for general surgery at Vanderbilt University and a full-time surgeon at the Veterans Administration (VA) Medical Center, Nashville, was named this year’s award recipient for his outstanding volunteer service. The Surgical Volunteerism Award was presented to Dr. Tarpley, in association with the award program’s sponsor, the Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative.
Dr. Tarpley has provided surgical services during volunteer medical expeditions to Nigeria over the course of 28 years in collaboration with his partner Donald Meier, MD, FACS, FWACS, El Paso, TX. In making these trips, he has provided surgical and medical training to numerous Nigerians and has been dedicated to improving the health care system in that country. Through his devotion to that personal mission, Dr. Tarpley’s efforts encouraged many fellow faculty members, residents, and medical students to join him in his humanitarian efforts. His work in Nigeria is based on a desire to equalize health care and health care education in the country and has provided humanitarian opportunities for American physicians and nurses who have traveled there to provide health care to patients and training to Nigerian physicians and surgeons.
The ACS/PMHI award was presented during the American College of Surgeons Board of Governors dinner, which is one of the highlights of the College’s 92nd Annual Clinical Congress. The volunteerism award is given “in recognition of those surgeons committed to giving something of themselves back to society by making significant contributions to surgical care through organized volunteer activities.”
A 1970 graduate of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Dr. Tarpley completed a general surgery residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD (1970-72 and 1974-77). He also served as a clinical associate in the surgery branch at the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, (1972-74) and as a registrar in cardiothoracic surgery at the Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, England (1975).
In 1978, Dr. Tarpley went to the Baptist Medical Centre, Ogbomoso, Nigeria, where he served as a surgeon, teacher, and lecturer until 1993. During that time period, he and his family alternated spending three years in Nigeria, then returning to Baltimore for one year, where Dr. Tarpley fulfilled duties in the Johns Hopkins department of surgery and the Loch Raven VA Medical Center. He and his family repeated that pattern for 15 years. During his time in Nigeria, Dr. Tarpley became immersed in the Ogbomoso culture and helped provide surgical and medical care to the community of more than one million people. Furthermore, Dr. Tarpley directed the Baptist Medical Centre residency program for 13 years and served as director of the hospital’s department of surgery for 10 years. Additionally, Dr. Tarpley helped establish an accredited general practice residency training program at Baptist Medical Centre. The residency program, which has a surgery section, along with medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, and community health sections, is responsible for helping more than half of Nigeria’s general practitioner fellows successfully pass examinations required to achieve fellowship status in the Nigerian College of General Medical Practice. Furthermore, Dr. Tarpley helped start a nursing school that has expanded to offer midwifery coursework.
Dr. Tarpley continues to make two-week to three-week-long annual trips to Ogbomoso accompanied by other surgical specialists and health care workers. During his visit in 2005, Dr. Tarpley helped with administering anesthesia, operated with houseofficers, and attended to over 300 patients who required medical attention at the clinic. Under the supervision of Dr. Tarpley and his team of plastic surgeon Louis Carter, MD, FACS, Chattanooga, TN, and pediatric surgeon Jire Idowu, MD, FACS, Oakland, CA, Nigerian surgeons performed 40 reconstructive procedures. During the visit, the three Fellows lectured and taught in order to continue their efforts to meet with, encourage, and guide former trainees and other health care providers. During the 2006 visit, Dr. Tarpley took a Vanderbilt chief resident to the West African College of Surgeons (WACS) meeting in Accra, Ghana, before proceeding on to Nigeria for lectures, clinics, rounds, and cases there.
A strong proponent of surgical volunteerism, Dr. Tarpley encourages medical students and non-surgeon physicians to engage in humanitarian medical missions of mercy by lecturing on surgery in the tropics and missionary medicine, co-teaching the international health elective at Vanderbilt with his wife of 40 years, Maggie, teaching surgery at the tropical health course at West Virginia University, Morgantown, and lecturing on “An Overview to Surgery in the Tropics” at the Tulane School of Tropical Medicine, New Orleans, LA, annually. Furthermore, he frequently speaks to medical societies, academic medical groups, and other organizations to promote medical volunteerism in the tropics and to encourage health care workers to contribute their time and skills in underserved areas in the US and abroad.
Dr. Tarpley’s work in Nigeria has also included helping with projects such as drilling wells to increase access to much needed water and providing vital immunizations. Moreover, he has hosted many Nigerians at his home in Nashville during their visits to the US for further surgical and medical education and training.
Dr. Tarpley is the sixth recipient of the ACS Surgical Volunteerism Award, which was inaugurated in 2003. The American College of Surgeons is a scientific and educational organization of surgeons that was founded in 1913 to raise the standards of surgical practice and to improve the care of the surgical patient. The College is dedicated to the ethical and competent practice of surgery. Its achievements have significantly influenced the course of scientific surgery in America and have established it as an important advocate for all surgical patients. The College has more than 70,000 members, and it is the largest organization of surgeons in the world (http://www.facs.org/).
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