The Swiss Surgeons in Ethiopia Foundation was founded in 2009 by Dr Jörg (Pele) Peltzer together with Swiss surgeon friends. Before founding the organisation, Jörg Peltzer worked for several years as a doctor in various development projects in south-western Ethiopia. The lack of access to medical care for the rural population prompted him to help these people.
In 2006, he opened the first trauma surgery centre in the whole of Ethiopia at the university hospital in Jimma. We have been running it ever since and, together with the University of Jimma, implemented the trauma surgery training programme called GO STAR.
Until 2020, the care and training of specialists was still in the hands of exclusively Swiss surgeons, but the hospital is now run by a 13-strong management team. The team teaches its staff on site according to the so-called "reversed fellowship" principle. This means that training takes place under local conditions and with local labour (surgeons, nurses, technicians, etc.). In addition, subcontractors for the hospital are now also being set up.
ESG principles are promoted and exemplified in day-to-day work, such as respect for human rights, appropriate anti-corruption measures and the use of a sustainable energy supply. With its strategy, the foundation not only helps accident patients, but also provides active development aid on site. People in need are helped and in most cases entire families are saved. Jobs are created, skilled labour is trained, the local quality of life is improved and the threat of emigration is counteracted.
GO STAR is committed to the sustainable improvement of medical care, particularly trauma surgery, for the population of Ethiopia. The focus is on promoting the training of medical specialists in Ethiopia.
As part of the GO STAR programme, we work with Swiss hospitals to deploy qualified surgeons, operating theatre nurses, physiotherapists and hospital specialists in Jimma to train and develop local hospital staff.
The foundation also has a major impact by supplying the hospital with important high-tech materials such as implants, screws, nails, fixators, drills and instruments, which are not available in Africa.
We are also involved in the construction and maintenance of new medical facilities and organise seminars and conferences to promote trauma surgery in Ethiopia.
Dr Jörg (Pele) Peltzer was born in Biel in 1965. He grew up in Biel-Benken (BL), where he also attended school. He completed his medical studies in Basel in 1991 with the state examination. He continued his training in surgery and anaesthesia in Chur. This was followed by years of surgical training as a junior doctor in Chur, Samedan, Lugano, Biel and Basel and as a senior consultant again in Biel and at the University Hospital of Basel.
In 1995, Jörg Peltzer worked as a REGA doctor in Samedan and continued in this role for a further 5 years in his spare time. Founding member of the "Swiss Society for Mountain Medicine".
In 1998 he qualified as a specialist in surgery, he also has a FMH title. In 2003 he specialised in general and trauma surgery. At the age of 35, he was elected Chief of Surgery at the "Hôpital de Jura" in Delémont.
Pele is speaker and instructor at many national and international courses and congresses.
2005 - 2015 he was member of the board of SGACT (Swiss Society of General Surgery and Traumatology), including 2 years as president.
As a medical student, he travelled to Ghana on holiday and was involved in a development project.
He was so impressed by the poverty of the people, but also by the African people's zest for life and courage, that he travelled to Ethiopia for the first time in 1999 as a medical specialist and worked as a senior physician in Karl-Heinz Böhm's "Menschen für Menschen" aid project in the hospital in Metu right at the border to Sudan. In 2003, he worked with great dedication as a war surgeon in the Congo, Bunia crisis area.
In 2006, he started his own trauma surgery project in Jimma (Ethiopia), which he named the GO STAR project.
He was able to combine this project, which was also financially costly, with his great hobby of cycling, at least for fundraising purposes. In his free time in Ethiopia, he pedalled kilometres on his bike and motivated his friends in Switzerland to donate an amount in favour of his project in Ethiopia for every kilometre ridden.
However, this steadily growing commitment increasingly exceeded Jörg Peltzer's time and financial resources.
In 2009, he founded the foundation Swiss Surgeons in Ethiopia together with Swiss surgeon friends. This foundation continues the GO STAR projects under the presidency of Dr Jörg Peltzer.
The foundation's structures are deliberately kept lean. As a result, the donations are used to a large extent in favour of accident surgery care in Ethiopia in accordance with the purpose of the foundation. The Board of Trustees carries out its wide-ranging activities largely on a voluntary basis.
The specialised trauma surgeons sent to Ethiopia are recruited from public hospitals in Switzerland and financed by the Foundation. Most of the medical staff (operating theatre nurses, physiotherapists, etc.) work for us in Ethiopia on a voluntary basis. The assignment is limited to three to six months. For special tasks and projects, we are supported by competent experts and specialists.
We treat donations with the utmost respect and only need 8% for the entire administration.
President
Chief Physician Hospital du Jura in Delémont, Switzerland.
Former President of the Swiss Society for General Surgery and Traumatology (SGACT)
Vice-President
Head of Joint Medical Master at the University of Lucerne and Zurich and at Lucerne Cantonal Hospital
Member
Certified fiduciary expert, financial planner, business consultant
Responsible for finance, controlling, administration.
Member
Entrepreneur, representative of the interests of French-speaking Switzerland.
Responsible for event organisation.
Member
National economist lic. rer. pol., Global business Management.
Responsible for local project development and implementation.
The annual financial statements are audited annually by the statutory auditors and a report is prepared for the Foundation. The auditors fulfil the legal and statutory requirements for auditing the annual financial statements of a charitable organisation.
Acton Revisions AG
Zug
CHE-101.865.078
The Foundation is subject to supervision by the Federal Department of Home Affairs.
The foundation enjoys the status of a charitable institution and is exempt from tax. Donations from private individuals and companies are therefore tax-deductible for the donor.
Please contact our office for all matters relating to our foundation:
GO STAR | Swiss Surgeons in Ethiopia
c/o OPTEX Treuhand AG
Rosenstrasse 2
6010 Kriens
Phone +41 41 340 83 83
contact@gostar.ch
www.gostar.ch
Contact person
Thomas Herzog
Member of the Board
"Everything we do for ourselves, we also do for others, and everything we do for others, we also do for ourselves." Thich Nhat Hanh
The Board prepares an annual activity report (in German) on the past foundation year for the attention of the supervisory authority and the tax authorities.
The accounts are prepared in accordance with the Swiss CAP FER 32 standard. The annual financial statements show the Foundation's assets as well as income and expenditure in the Foundation year (document in German). Additional information can be found in the notes and the cash flow statement.
The Board has drawn up a Code of Ethics and Conduct in addition to the Articles of Association and regulations (in German).
This contains generally applicable principles, standards and behaviour for all of the Foundation's activities. It is based on the highest social, legal and ethical standards of behaviour and obliges those involved to comply with national and international agreements and humanitarian aid standards.
The Code of Conduct is binding for all members of governing bodies and for the Foundation's employees and operational staff. Consultants, agents and representatives of the Foundation must respect this Code of Conduct and are expressly bound by it.
Founded in 1899, Jimma University is one of the largest public universities in Ethiopia. It brings together numerous educational institutions, such as the Agricultural College founded in 1952 and the Jimma Health Institute founded in 1983. Jimma University has over 2600 lecturers and around 42000 students. The university is the first in the country to pursue an innovative approach by orientating its teaching towards society and the learning content is correspondingly practice-oriented. The University of Jimma has its own hospital, which is both a referral hospital for south-west Ethiopia and a training centre for medical staff.
We work closely with those responsible at the hospital to ensure that the specialist training in the field of trauma surgery is as closely aligned as possible with the medical needs and training of the students.
To ensure that the Ethiopian doctors in Jimma are trained by Swiss specialists all year round, we work together with various hospitals in Switzerland. Without the partnership with Swiss hospitals, we would hardly be able to recruit the necessary specialists for our project.
We currently have partnerships with the Cantonal hospital Lucerne and the University hospital Basel.
As a globally active medical technology company, Johnson & Johnson AG (Switzerland) grants us generous purchasing conditions for the procurement of implants, surgical and consumable materials as well as orthopaedic materials.
DEZA (Federal Department for Development and Cooperation)
Thanks to financial support from the SDC, we were able to develop an IT knowledge transfer tool based on iPads as part of our "Teaching & Knowledge" project in 2015.
This knowledge tool, which is unique in Africa, is an important instrument for knowledge transfer and training in the operating theatre, but also in bedside care.
GO STAR | Swiss surgeons in Ehtiopia
c/o Luzerner Kantonsspital
Spitalstrasse 16
CH-6000 Luzern
Postal account 60-334455-9
IBAN CH62 0900 0000 6033 4455 9
