Huntington Beach family embarks on latest medical mission trip to Peru
Have toys. Will travel.
Jessie and Alexis Ross left on an airplane from Los Angeles International Airport on Friday night with their father, Dr. Timothy Ross.
The Huntington Beach residents headed to Ayaviri, Peru for a two-week trip. But this was much more than just a vacation to see the sights for Jessie and Alexis — a sophomore and freshman respectively at Huntington Beach High School — and their dad.
The Rosses are part of a medical missions trip of about 20 people, a joint effort of Solidaridad en March (SEM) and the Christian Life Movement. They will set up shop in Ayaviri, a small town in a mountainous area that has an elevation of nearly 13,000 feet, to treat locals who need help.
Timothy Ross, an orthopedic surgeon, made the decision to take his daughters with him on medical missions to South America many years ago. His oldest daughter Cassie, now a 26-year-old lawyer who lives in San Diego, has also been on several of them but isn’t making the trip this time due to work constraints.
The case for having Jessie and Alexis along on the trips is simple. Their mother, Luisa, is originally from Mexico, so the whole family is fluent in Spanish.
“Being in high school, we can’t necessarily do surgery or prescribe medications or anything along those lines,” Jessie Ross said. “But we can translate for doctors, we can transport patients from triage to different sections where they need to go, we can play with the kids and give them toys. Even adults sometimes tend to enjoy these gifts that we have.”
The girls organized a toy drive at Huntington Beach High leading up to the trip. Boxes were placed in the classrooms of three teachers, and the girls collected dozens of used but loved toys. At their home on Thursday, they started packing the toys in duffle bags for the trip.
The idea is that they will gift the toys to the Peruvian children and post the pictures on social media, so their friends back home can see where their former favorite teddy bear ended up. The teenagers make a difference in this way and others.
“They’re so helpful, they’re constantly running around doing things for people and they bring everyone so much happiness,” Cassie Ross said. “They’re just happy kids that are spreading joy basically. When they went on their first trip, I was like, ‘Are we sure about this?’ But by the end of the trip, everyone’s coming up and complimenting them and how great they are.”
This is the third and fourth medical missions trip to South America, respectively, for Alexis and Jessie, though their first one to Peru. They both started participating in the missions when they were 8 or 9, similar to their older sister.
The coronavirus pandemic slowed things down a bit, but the girls did go to Mindo, Ecuador in May 2022, a place the family has been several times through a nonprofit called Mindo Futures. They’ve also been to Guatemala.
Patients typically line up outside of the school or orphanage or church where the missions team is staying. More than a decade ago, when Cassie was about 14, she met her friend Mayra in Ecuador.
“The first time I saw her, she was limping toward the clinic area in Ecuador,” Cassie Ross said. “I think I went up to her asking where she was going. She said she was looking for the orthopedic doctor.”
When Mayra was younger, an animal fell on her leg and she had to get it amputated just below the knee. She was given a prosthetic leg, but it fit poorly and she grew out of it. Her bone started to protrude from her skin.
After Timothy Ross did a procedure to cut the bone down a bit, Mayra got fitted for a better prosthetic.
“When she was being put under the anesthesia, I was holding her hand in the operating room,” Cassie Ross said. “She was extremely scared.”
Mayra now has a phone, so she communicates with Cassie via WhatsApp or Instagram when she can.
The clinic typically has “rooms” put up via curtains. Jessie Ross remembers the time on her second mission when an elderly Ecuadorian woman came in who didn’t know her birthday or even her current age. So the group made the impromptu decision to grab some candy and toys and throw her a birthday party.
The next time that the Ross clan came back to Ecuador, her son had researched when her birthday actually was.
“Her son got a tattoo of her birthday on his neck,” Jessie Ross said. “It was very sentimental to them. They really appreciate what the doctors in the medical missions have done, which is the goal.
“When you start doing it, you get that feeling where it’s like, ‘I can’t imagine my life without it.’ I feel as though they have that same sensation … It’s nice to see people who care.”
Cassie, the oldest daughter, went to Duke University for law school after graduating from Huntington Beach High and going to UC Davis for her undergraduate studies. She didn’t end up with a career in medicine.
Still, she said her favorite law work is the pro bono work she does involving refugee asylum cases.
“Once I got into the legal field I realized how many legal topics are cross-border issues,” she said. “I’ve gone to the border in Laredo, Texas. I think these type of medical mission trips, even though I didn’t become a doctor, have still influenced what I decided to do.”
The younger sisters also hope to continue making a difference.
“When I tell my friends about it, I just feel happy that I got to help out in a way that really not that many people can,” Alexis Ross said.
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