Between surgical missions, Dr. Andrew Jacono has scaled some of the world’s most demanding peaks, including Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Cotopaxi in Ecuador, and Mount Elbrus in Russia. Each climb doubled as a fundraising campaign, generating support for two causes he has championed throughout his career: survivors of domestic violence and children needing reconstructive surgery.
The climbs fit a pattern Dr. Andrew Jacono has followed for years, pairing personal physical challenges with the less visible logistical costs of humanitarian medicine. Flying surgical teams overseas, securing supplies, and covering care for patients who cannot pay all require funding that mountain expeditions have helped provide.
Two Causes, One Mission
Dr. Jacono’s domestic work centers on the FACE TO FACE project, run through the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, where he serves as senior advisor. Through that program, he has performed reconstructive procedures for more than 100 survivors of domestic violence, repairing facial injuries left by abuse.
Dr. Andrew Jacono international missions, meanwhile, have treated more than 750 children across countries such as Colombia, Thailand, and Vietnam, addressing cleft lip and palate, microtia, facial tumors, and burn scars. He typically travels twice a year with organizations including Healing the Children and the HUGS Foundation.
A Practice With Two Faces
Dr. Jacono maintains a Park Avenue facial plastic surgery practice in New York alongside this humanitarian schedule, treating cosmetic patients during much of the year before departing on missions or expeditions. That dual life, elite private practice paired with pro bono global outreach, has become a defining feature of his career.
As Fellowship Director for the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Dr. Jacono also teaches younger surgeons that raising money for humanitarian causes can be as demanding, and as necessary, as the surgeries those funds eventually support. Refer to this article for related information.
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