David Patton, Flying Eye Hospital, dies in 94

He died on April 3 at his home in Renault, Nev, he was 94 years old, and he died on April 3 at his home in Renault, Nev, and he was 94 years old, and he died on April 3 at his home in Renault, Nev, and he was the age of the ideal and innovative eye specialist who started the Urbis project, where he converted an United flight plane to a flight hospital that took surgeons to the developing countries to work on patients and educate Local doctors, at his home in Renault, Nev.

His death was confirmed by his son Towlly.

New York’s prominent surgeon in New York, among them the Shah of Iran and funded Jerebont Morgan, Dr. On Tone “teaching at the Wilmer Eye Institute at Jones Hopkins University in the early seventies of the last century when he became frustrated by increasing the incidents of bond at the most extreme.

“More ophthalmologists were needed,” he wrote in his memoirs, “The second sight: the views of Odyssea, the ophthalmologist” (2011), “but as much as it was important that the need to promote medical education for the current doctors.”

But how?

He thought about charging equipment trunks – the way he would almost do the circus – but that provided logistical challenges. He thought about the possibility of using a medical ship like those that the project sends, a humanitarian group, around the world. It was very slow for him.

Dr. Patton wrote: “Soon after the first moon landed in 1969, great thinking became a reality.”

Then the Monchott idea struck him: “Can the plane be the answer?

All he needed was a plane. He asked the army to donate, but that was not specified. He approached many universities to get money to buy one, but officials rejected him, saying that the idea was not possible.

“David was ready to bear the risks that others did not do,” said Bruce Spavi, the founding president of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. “He was a magician. He was inspiring. He did not resign.”

Dr. Patton decided to raise funds on his own. In 1973, the Orbis project was founded with a group of well -connected wealthy weilman community personalities such as Texas Oilman Leonard F. Gut and Petsi Tribe WinriatDaughter of the founder of global global airlines Juan Trip.

In 1980, Mr. Trippe helped persuade the CEO of UNITED Airlines Edward Carlson to donate the DC-8 plane. The United States Agency for International Development contributed $ 1.25 million to turn the plane into a hospital with the operating room, a recovery area and classrooms equipped with TVs, so that local medical workers can watch surgeries.

Surgeons and nurses volunteered their services, and they agreed to spend two to four weeks abroad. It was the first trip, in 1982, to Panama. Then the plane went to Peru, Jordan, Nepal and abroad. Mother Teresa Once a visit. And so did the Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

In 1999, the Sunday Times of London magazine sent a correspondent to Cuba to write about the plane, now known as the name Eye Aviation Hospital. One of the patients who arrived in a 14 -year -old girl was Julia.

“In developed countries, Julia’s case was more than just irritation,” said the Sunday Times article. “It is almost certain that it suffers from iris inflammation, which is intra -eye inflammation, which can be cleared with drops. In Britain, even cats are treated easily.”

Her doctor, Edward Holland, was a prominent eye surgeon.

“The Netherlands uses small knives to make holes that allow him to get his tools in the eye, and soon he pulls the tissues of the julia sciat.” “When the tissue is pulled, a dark, invisible pupil is detected for a decade. It is an intimate and mobile moment; this is the music of the medical room. Then, it breaks and removes the cataracts of the eye, and sows the lens so that the eye maintains its shape.”

Cuban ophthalmologists were watching in the viewing room.

But after surgery, Julia could not see.

“Then a simple miracle begins,” the article said. “When the swelling begins to get off, you discover the world around it. A minute of a minute can see something new.”

David Patton was born on August 16, 1930, in Baltimore, and grew up in Manhattan. His father, Richard Townley PattonSpecialized in corneal transplants and established Al Ain Bank to restore sight. His mother, Helen (gemstones) PatonHe was an internal designer.

In his memoirs, he described “between people who receive them on a large scale, intellectually sharp, wide in the institution.” He practiced his father on Park Street. His mother delivered parties at her home on the upper eastern side.

David enrolled in Hill School, an internal school in Potistown, Pennsylvania, met James A. Baker III, Texas, who later became Foreign Minister of President Ronald Reagan. They were the colleagues of the room at Princeton University and the best friends for life.

“David came from a very distinct background, but he was on the ground and a very loved young man,” Mr. Baker said in an interview. “He had his goals in life straight. He was a much hell for a better student than I was.”

After graduating from Princeton in 1952, David obtained his medical degree from Johns Hopkins University. He worked for high positions at the Wilmer Eye Institute and worked as Head of the Department of Ophthalmology at the Bilor College of Medicine in Houston.

In 1979, while he was still trying to buy a plane for the Orbis project, he became the medical director of King Khalid Eye Hospital in Riyadh in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

“Among my duties,” he wrote in his memoirs, “He provides eye care for many princes and princesses in the Kingdom – about 5,000 of them, and I was told – and it seems that all of them insisted that they be treated exclusively by the responsible doctor, regardless of their weight.”

The marriage of Dr. Patton Lujain Sterman and Jane Frank ended in divorce. He married Diane Johnston in 1985 He died In 2022.

In addition to his son, he survived by two granddaughters.

Dr. Patton left his role as a medical director of the European project in 1987, after a dispute with the Board of Directors. That year, President Ronald Reagan gave him the medal of presidential citizens.

Although his official relationship with the organization has ended, he sometimes worked as an informal advisor.

It is now called Orbis International, and it is on board the third plane, which is the MD-10 donated by the Federal Express.

From 2014 to 2023, Orbis conducted more than 621,000 surgeries and procedures, according to its last annual report, and submitted more than 424,000 training sessions for doctors, nurses and other service providers.

“The plane is just a unique place.” “It was just an incredibly bold idea.”