OU Health Surgeon Back Home Following Mission Trip In Ukraine

An OU Health surgeon is back on red dirt after going on a mission trip to Ukraine. 

Dr. Robert Lim is a former military surgeon, he was deployed six times in his 23 years of service before working at OU Health out of Tulsa. 

He and others a part of the Global Surgical Medical Support Group spent two weeks in Ukraine helping refugees. 

“There were thousands of people crossing the border from Ukraine to Poland. Carrying their kids, their backpacks, strollers whatever they could whole families coming across it was just a very moving and sad times to see these thousands and thousands of people being displaced from their home country,” said the Doctor. 

He said his experience and personal ties to Ukraine made the decision to go help easy. 

“I have a special attachment to Ukraine because we adopted a girl back in 2012 from Ukraine. We have spent a lot of time in Ukraine, we have a lot of friends there. Unfortunately, one of the people who helped us adopt our daughter died in the early days of the war,” he said. 

His group gave refugees medical care, surgical care and training. 

“The military training really prepared me very well. Handle triage questions, handle the chaos, handle some of the uncertainty,” said the Doctor.  

Classes on how to apply tourniquet, establish and maintain an open airway quickly filled up with 80-100 refugees ready to learn. 

“They were just all in, they wanted to do something they knew was going to help their country,” said Lim. 

In the two weeks they were there the group was able to train about 1,500 Ukrainian citizens.