Foreword
Bob Mirani
Chairman
It has been a century since an American
soldier came to the Philippines in
1899 to spend the mid-years of his
life serving Filipinos who were physically
deformed and disfigured. Irving S.
Hart, or Daddy Hart as he was fondly
called, founded the Philippine Band
of Mercy in 1937. Since then, the
PBM has taken on the mission of providing
thousands of indigent Filipinos, unfortunately
physically disfigured at birth, with
the opportunity to avail of medical
help and support for reconstruction,
rehabilitation and medical treatment.
In all its 69 years of existence,
the Philippine Band of Mercy has attended
to indigent Filipinos suffering from
cleft/palate harelips, cataract and
glaucoma in children, hydrocephalus
and meningocele.
Relationships and networks have been
established and maintained with the
country’s top specialists and doctors
and the various hospitals so that
these services could be rendered to
the indigents for free, with PBM shouldering
the costs of the treatment. Aside
from the medical services, the PBM
has also maintained therapists and
speech experts to provide patients
with adequate psychological support
so that after the operation, they
will be able to adjust to a new renewed
life offered by the opportunity to
be assimilated into society. As the
handicapped and the disfigured are
afforded a chance to improve, reshape
or reconstruct their physical deformities,
PBM’s patients are helped into becoming
renewed citizens of society, able
to merge with people and make a contribution,
instead of being wasted away, isolated
or unjustly alienated and abandoned,
simply because of an abnormality in
their features or in their physical
condition. This report is a chronicle
of the milestones and achievements
of the Philippine Band of Mercy across
69 years of existence. At the same
time, it is a fitting tribute to Daddy
Hart, Paz Reyes, and to the hundreds
of volunteers and members who have
helped the organization to pursue
its mission during the fledgling years
of the 1930’s and the 1940’s, its
climactic growth in the 1950’s and
the 1960’s, the quiet years of the
1970’s, and its comeback in the 1980’s
and the 1990’s. Historically, PBM’s
existence these past years marked
a gradual evolution in its relentless
drive to serve and to stay alive.
Surviving purely on donations alone,
PBM’s efforts to help its beneficiaries
were sometimes restrained by lack
of funds. Moreover, the technology
during the earlier years also had
to be reckoned with. Although the
technology and knowledge used then
may have been considered modern and
suitable during these time periods,
there were still a myriad of ailments
and diseases which such technology
could not fathom or cure. Moreover,
while there were truly many success
cases, there were also times when
certain hindrances arose or some diseases
proved to be untreatable because medical
science at that time was still searching
for more adequate and effective treatments,
cures and alternatives.
The past has indeed been quite a journey,
with many lessons learned, many successes
reaped, and hardships undergone. As
we move on to the new millennium,
there is more optimism that PBM will
be able to reset its directions and
achieve greater heights. Armed with
a rejuvenated spirit of lending a
helping hand, coupled with a more
balanced and skillful decision-making
process, PBM believes it is now in
a position to be proactive, to re-create
its future and set its course for
a more inspired and fulfilling destiny.
Furthermore, medical science and technology
have taken a great leap forward over
69 years and many illnesses and diseases
once thought hopeless or incurable
can now be managed, eliminated or
even prevented. With all these above-mentioned
factors, combined with PBM’s current
solid financial standing, PBM eventually
hopes to elevate its status to becoming
a full-pledged funding agency, capable
of supporting other civic organizations
aiding indigents on a larger scale
and doing high-level philanthropic
work to the maximum. When this happens,
more and more people can benefit and
various types of medical services
can now be made available to them.
We dedicate this report to the thousands
of Filipinos out there, to those who
have supported us and continue to
help us, to those whose lives we have
touched and help to change and improve,
as well as to those whom we are about
to encounter and usher into a new
life. |
