San Rafael doctor named 'pediatric hero' for work in Latin America

"It looked to me like she was about to quit breathing," recalled Cohen, who at the time was in a remote Guatemalan mountain village, a 90-minute hike and a 45-minute boat ride away from the Ak' Tenamit clinic where he was working as a volunteer.

Fortunately, Cohen had brought along some injectable epinephrine and albuterol.

"Which helped stabilize her until we could get her to our clinic," said Cohen, who was in Washington D.C. this weekend to be recognized as a "Pediatric Hero" by the American Academy of Pediatrics. Cohen, a pediatrician with Kaiser Permanente in San Rafael was one of just four doctors receiving the award from among nearly 400 nominees.

Cohen, 47, of Berkeley, was selected for his work in founding Global Pediatric Alliance, a nonprofit that provides educational workshops for indigenous midwives and health practitioners in Latin America. The idea came to Cohen when he was volunteering in Guatemala in 2002, where he met Paulina.

One of his jobs was to work with local Mayan health promoters. In poor regions, where access to state health services is limited, lay midwives and health promoters often provide initial and essential maternal and child health care.

"It was very exciting to be a doctor there," Cohen said. "But what seemed to be a more sustainable effort to increase the health of women and children in those areas was to educate local

indigenous health workers."

Cohen, who grew up in Bangor, Maine, got his first taste of practicing medicine in developing nations in Gabon, West Africa in 1988 as an Albert Schweitzer Fellow.

He received his M.D. from Tufts University in Boston in 1989 and his diploma in tropical medicine from Royal College of Surgery in Ireland in 2000. He completed his pediatric residency at Oakland Children's Hospital in 1992.

Cohen said the recession has made it tougher to attract funding for Global Pediatric Alliance, which operates with a yearly budget of just $150,000. The nonprofit depends almost entirely on donations from individuals. But Cohen said his "hero" award has provided him with new encouragement.

"It gives me a lot of hope and optimism to keep doing the work we're doing," he said.

To learn more about Global Pediatric Alliance or to donate, visit www.globalpediatricalliance.org

Contact Richard Halstead via e-mail at rhalstead@marinij.com

Read more San Rafael stories at the IJ's San Rafael section.

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