Sun Yao's lips were always purple, but not because he had an affection for blue raspberry candies. Sun, a four-year-old boy from central China, was suffering from a malfunctioning heart that caused the amount of oxygen circulating in his blood stream to fall to dangerously low levels. He needed open-heart surgery to live, so he was brought to Israel as part of the Save A Child's Heart program. As Jonah Mink '06, who volunteered with the program this past summer, watched Sun lying there on the operating table, he was in awe.

"[The doctors had] just saved his life, literally," Mink said. "It was unbelievable."

Since 1995, SACH has saved the lives of over a thousand children like Sun.

The program was founded by Dr. Ami Cohen, a former surgeon in the United States Army.

While serving in Korea in 1988, Cohen came into contact with the head of an international organization known as Save the Hearts, which was then sending orphaned and impoverished children to the West to receive medical care. Cohen was so taken by the program that he joined it, performing 35 pediatric cardiac operations during the remainder of his time in Korea.

Cohen immigrated to Israel in 1992 and began work at the Wolfson Medical Center in Azur, a suburb near Tel Aviv, and brought his passion for saving children's lives with him.

In 1995, Cohen was contacted by an Ethiopian doctor who begged him to perform heart surgery on two children. He did, and those two surgeries gave birth to the SACH program.

SACH's website says the program chooses its patients from third-world countries without regard to race, religion, sex or background. Once a child is approved for SACH, he and his family are often brought to Israel for the surgery.

Not all patients must travel to Israel, however, because some operations are performed in the child's home country as well as in the United States and Germany.

The total cost per patient is roughly $10,000, which is raised from private donations. More than 70 volunteers allow for more than 90 percent of the money raised by SACH to go toward the cost of operations. From 1996 to 2004, SACH examined 3,521 children, treated 1,174 and achieved a success rate of 96 percent.

Mink became involved in this effort when he learned of SACH from his girlfriend, Karen Chernick '06.

"It sounded like a great opportunity," Mink said. "I wanted to learn about the medical aspects of what [the doctors] did."

Mink, a neuroscience major, said he learned a great deal about medicine since the doctors allowed him a front-row seat to witness surgeries in the operating room.

"I observed open-heart surgery and other tests, and all the doctors explained everything they were doing to me in English," he said.

But the most important thing Mink said he learned during his time with SACH is sometimes a broken heart can help heal the world. SACH patients often come from a variety of places, and for many the SACH experience is their first contact with people of other cultures.

The patients and their parents hail from 23 different countries including China, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Ghana, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Romania, Russia, Somalia, the Ukraine and Vietnam, and are brought to Israel by SACH to stay in a house in Azur. They live in this house during the days preceding surgery as well as throughout recovery time, which can last anywhere from two to four weeks.

Given their vastly different backgrounds, parents and patients often come to SACH with prejudices. Mink said that he observed an Iraqi family that at first was reluctant to interact with some of the families from Africa. But after a few weeks, they began to see things differently.

"All the preconceptions they have are stripped away down to the fundamental humanness," Mink said.

"The people in the house all get along remarkably well. They realize they're all in the same boat. They even eat together, and they share different recipes."

Mink said that by the end of a stay, sets of families that once avoided each other resemble old friends. And when it comes time to return home, they often share tearful embraces.

"It's amazing to see that come out and wipe the slate closer to clean," Mink said. "They keep that when they go back to their countries, and I hope that spreads. Aside from the fact that they're saving hundreds of lives a year, that's the most amazing thing about the program."

When not building tolerance, the patients in the SACH program seem to be just trying to act like normal kids. They play various games with each other, which, for some of these children is especially important because many were limited in their activities before their surgery. Since communication is sometimes hindered, a number of different methods are used. Mink said that he taught many of the families English, but sometimes the only way to make a point was through gestures.

"You'd have one word someone would know, like 'good,'" Mink said. "Then you would make a big motion for 'very good.'"

Mink found his experience so valuable that he plans to volunteer at the SACH house again.

"This is the best thing I've ever done," Mink said. "It's an unbelievable organization. I loved every minute I was there."

For more information on SACH, contact Jonah Mink at jwmpro@gmail.com or visit saveachildsheart.com