A doctor born in the central city of Hue who now lives in Germany, has for more than a decade lent a helping hand to bring a smile to more than 4,000 Vietnamese children with congenital hare lips and cleft palates.

The man with the golden heart is Professor Ton That Hua, who is currently working as a coordinator for the German-Vietnamese Association to promote healthcare in Vietnam .

He graduated from Hue Medical University in 1967 and went to France and then Germany to access more training in general and emergency surgery.

“I needed to make a greater effort than Germans in my studies before being acknowledged professionally,” the doctor, who is now 68, recalled.

Hua’s devotion to medicine paid off as he landed a job at the Wurzburg University Hospital , 120km from Frankfurt , where he has held a key post at the anaestheti s a and post-surgery department for many years.

When he first returned home to Hue in 1993, it changed the professor’s life, as he saw many children who could not smile because they had had hare lips and cleft palates since birth and their parents could not afford an operation.

On his return to Germany , Doctor Hua began to raise funds, at first from his friends and colleagues, to sponsor operations for these children.

Then in 1998, he and some other friends founded the German-Vietnamese Association to promote healthcare in Vietnam , which has seen large numbers of German professors and doctors operate on children with hare lips and cleft palates free of charge.

Of the more than 4,000 children who have benefited from the association’s activities since 1998, more than 1,150 are from Hue City .

Apart from bringing smiles to these children, the German-Vietnamese Association has also assisted Vietnamese doctors to develop their careers by helping them to undertake further training courses, ranging from six months to three years, in Germany.

As he has given such a practical contribution, Dr. Hua has been honoured by the Health Ministry and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The doctor confided that he wants to return home to work and live for the rest of his life./.