.bodytext {float: left; } .floatimg-left-hort { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right: 10px; width:300px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-caption-hort { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:300px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-vert { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right:15px; width:200px;} .floatimg-left-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; font-size: 10px; width:200px;} .floatimg-right-hort { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px;} .floatimg-right-caption-hort { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimg-right-vert { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px;} .floatimg-right-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; border-top-style: double; border-top-color: black; border-bottom-style: double; border-bottom-color: black;} .floatimgright-sidebar p { line-height: 115%; text-indent: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar h4 { font-variant:small-caps; } .pullquote { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 150px; background: url(http://www.dmbusinessdaily.com/DAILY/editorial/extras/closequote.gif) no-repeat bottom right !important ; line-height: 150%; font-size: 125%; border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} .floatvidleft { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatvidright { float:right; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} Dr. Elise DeVore was working in the remote village of Nana Kenieba, Mali, in early 2000. Medicine was in short supply for babies suffering from high fevers, infections and malaria. Many were likely to die. DeVore rode six hours on the back of a vegetable truck to the country’s capital, Bamako, to send an e-mail to her father, an associate professor of global studies at Des Moines University.

“Can you bring some medicine?” the e-mail said. “I can’t be a doctor without medicine.”

Now, seven years later, the mission to Mali that e-mail sparked has been carried on, and on Sept. 22, doctors, nurses, medical students and public health officials will make their 17th trip to the country as part of the Medicine for Mali campaign.

“This visit we will see around 1,000 very sick people,” said Dr. Stephen DeVore, Elise’s father and executive director of Medicine for Mali Inc.

The group makes two trips a year to the West African country. The trip involves 26 hours of flight time and a four-hour drive in hazardous conditions to an isolated community of around 8,000.

“The entire organization is just volunteers,” DeVore said. “We get people from all over the country to volunteer for these trips. We actually have more volunteering to go than we can afford to send over.”

The organization, which has formed a partnership with Des Moines University, has managed to establish five clinics in Mali at which its volunteers work for 10 days on their visits. The vast majority of the funding the group receives is through private donations from people in the community.

“We have very wonderful philanthropists here who understand the plight of West Africa,” DeVore said. “It’s quite dismal. In Mali, one out of every five children dies before the age of 5.”

The biggest help the group can get is financial contributions, DeVore said. But any medical professionals who are interested in helping should contact the group.

“But financial help is what we need the most,” he said.

A recent audit of the organization’s financials found that 96.23 percent of all the money that comes in goes to Africa.

“That’s a very high percentage,” DeVore said. “Not many groups can say that much of their money goes into their programs. But we’re all volunteers. No one gets a salary.”