Community
NYC Paratriathlon National Championships
Challenged Athletes that made the podium at the New York City Paratriathlon National Championships who have also attended one of the CAF Paratriathlon camps.
The Men's and Women's Tri 2 division champions (Travis Ricks & Melissa Stockwell) at the NYC Paratriathlon National Championships
CAF- San Diego Triathlon Challenge
CAF, Challenged Athletes Foundation, is a group that raises money so people with physical challenges can participate and compete in the sports that they love. CAF enhances those individual’s self esteem, independence and quality of life.
Since 1994, CAF has fulfilled thousands of funding requests from physically challenged individuals across the United States and around the world. CAF provides funds to entry and elite level physically challenged athletes for the acquisition of adaptive sports equipment and to pay for specialized training and competition expenses.
CAF reaches, educates and inspires more than 60,000 people annually.
SCOPe Orthotics & Prosthetics, Inc. has been a major sponsor to CAF for many years and we are proud to be involved with any CAF event!
For more information or to support CAF go to www.challengedathletes.org or call (858) 866-0959
SCOPe Orthotics & Prosthetics, Inc. to Sponsor The San Diego Triathlon Challenge
The San Diego Triathlon Challenge (SDTC) is a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike and 13.1 mile run triathlon.
Rotary Prosthetic Clinic of Santa Ana, El Salvador
Having joined La Mesa Rotary in 1992, SCOPe Orthotics & Prosthetics, Inc. managing partner and prosthetist, Eddy Gosschalk, CPO became president of La Mesa Rotary in 2000. As part of that process he attended the International Rotary conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina where his path crossed with Orange County orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Michael Abdalla. As fate had it, Dr. Abdalla had contacts with physicians/Rotarians in Santa Ana, El Salvador and had begun early discussions about a prosthetic team coming into the region to provide artificial limbs to the local population.
This approach has many weaknesses including no follow up for adjustments, new sockets and a continual dependency on outside entities. Realizing the benefit of the adage that it is better to teach a man to fish than to give him a fish, the two in cooperation with Rod Cuervo, CP and the Rotary Club of Santa Ana, created a plan to build a permanent clinic, staffed with a local prosthetic/orthotic technician, trained by the team to fit basic below knee prostheses and simple bracing systems, and the eventual goal of financial self sufficiency.
Santa Ana is a city in the North of El Salvador and is home to a population of nearly 500,000 with no local orthotic and prosthetic care available. The history that prompted this project was a 12-year civil war that resulted in tens of thousands of young land mine victims with resultant limb loss. Any one who has visited the country immediately realizes that the cities are not disability friendly and the loss of a limb without the means to replace it means a consignment to life long poverty and isolation.
A deal was struck with the Charity Hospital of Santa Ana and the then current national leadership to build the clinic at our own expense with the hospital providing the space for the build out and the government guaranteeing the salary of the local technician. The funds were provided by several private entities, including SCOPe Orthotics and Prosthetics, private donations and grants from several Rotary clubs including the Rotary club of La Mesa and the Rotary club of Orange.
In 2003 the doors opened and the opening ceremonies resulted in the first 20 amputees receiving prosthetic care. With each succeeding trip to El Salvador, Edith, the resident technician, was given additional training so that now the clinic is providing orthotic care to the pediatric and adult patients who so greatly are in need of care. For the past several years, the clinic has operated without the need for additional funding but recent elections have resulted in a change of government to a more leftist philosophy and the model of the clinic stands in peril.
The current model involves charging patients according to their abilities as determined by local social workers at the hospital. The current government leadership does not want the clinic to charge for any of its services but has not yet provided alternate funding modalities other than a return to outside, international grant funding. Negotiations are currently in progress but should they fail to produce a mutually acceptable model, the clinic will be moved out of it’s current government owned location to a privately owned property.
