Lifetime Achievement Award > Dr. Salamon
to Liberia through an organization called Mercy Ships, a non-profit enterprise that seeks to provide medical care to developing counties through the use a self-contained hospital ship. The opportunity, though incredibly rewarding, left Dr. Salamon wanting more. “It was missing something,” he said. “There was an opportunity to help patients, but not an opportunity to teach.” From here, Dr. Salamon began seeking out other medical mission opportunities, specifically those that would allow him to interact with local physicians and share as much knowledge and expertise as possible. “There are lots and lots of opportunities to do this,” he adds. “Every operation has a teaching aspect.” In the subsequent years, Dr. Salamon has served on medical missions to countries such as Honduras, Costa Rica, Trinidad and Tobago, Bhutan, Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia. This wide array of destinations has given him remarkable insight into a variety of conditions faced by his physician colleagues across the globe. “There are always differences,” he said. “You may be doing things at a very different level depending on which county you are in.” Additionally, by working through organizations such as Health Volunteers Overseas, CURE International, Operation Rainbow and the American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society, Dr. Salamon has been able to interface with and educate international physicians, something that will hopefully address many of the untreated, or undertreated, medical conditions that he sees while treating patients abroad. For Dr. Salamon, who also frequently travels the world recreationally with his
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wife of 45 years, these medical missions are an opportunity to combine personal and professional passions. “It melds pretty well,” he says. “I always try to leave something behind, not just take pictures.”
In addition to his practice in Stockton, his role as an educator at UC Davis and multiple medical missions, Dr. Salamon’s career is also highlighted by years of service to organized medicine, including a term as president of the San Joaquin County Medical Society during the 1980s. Dr. Salamon now looks back proudly on these years, noting
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