Tag: boston university

Dr. Nichter and Plasticos Foundation featured in Boston University Article

Dr. Larry Nichter and the Plasticos Foundation have been featured in an article on the Boston University website.

The article highlighted Plasticos Foundation’s work in Laos, and in particular the story of a 14-year-old girl who was able to walk again thanks to the team’s efforts. Importantly, the article described how disfigurements and birth defects often lead to social exclusion. Thus the Plasticos team’s work improves not only the patient’s physical well-being but gives them a new life by providing them with social acceptance.

The featured trip was on January 2009, and provided 95 patients with much-needed reconstructive surgery. However, this is just one of many Plasticos missions. Previous and subsequent missions have included Cuba, India, Armenia, and Cambodia.

Also emphasized in the article was the Plasticos Foundation’s “teach a man to fish” philosophy. The team not only performs surgeries but also trains local doctors and nurses to continue this work even after the Plasticos team has left. Dr. Nichter is quoted in the article:

When I went back to Vietnam, for instance, I asked someone I trained three years previously how many cleft lips he had done, and he said, ‘Oh, about a thousand.’ He performed more in three years than I’ll probably do in my lifetime. That is humbling and gratifying.”

The full text of the article is available on Boston University’s website.

More information on the Plasticos Foundation is available on its website.

Larry Nichter, MD receives Boston University Award

Larry Nichter, MD was honored by receiving the Boston University CGS 60th Anniversary Alumni Achievement Award on September 29, 2012.

Only two such awards were given. Dr. Nichter also was inducted to the Boston University Collegium of Distinguished Alumni for the College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts. This is the highest university alumni accolade and was presented to Dr. Nichter by the American Ambassador to China, also a BU graduate.

From the Boston University website:

Dr. Lawrence Nichter (CGS ’71, CAS ’73, MED ’78) is from a BU family.  Besides his mother receiving her Doctorate of Education, his sister, Susan, received degrees from the College of Fine Arts. Larry attended CGS, CLA and BUSM. Currently he is a Clinical Professor of Plastic Surgery at USC and UCI, Chairman, Department of Plastic Surgery at one of the largest hospital departments in the world, and President and Founder of Plasticos Foundation. The latter is a Non-profit institution that trains surgeons while repairing children’s deformities worldwide. He has been on 60 oversees missions thus far and a documentary about one of his trips won an Academy Award. Every institution that Lawrence Nichter has received a degree from has distinguished him with special honors including University of Virginia presenting an annual research award in his name, UCLA giving him an outstanding resident award, and BU College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts presenting him with an outstanding alumni award in 2009.