(Philadelphia) -- Tomorrow, the Middle East Medical Society will be born ... and, as it blossoms, an unprecedented dialogue will be unleashed between American physicians and their Arab and Israeli colleagues practicing today in Middle Eastern countries. The stated mission of the new Society is to promote fellowship among Middle Eastern physicians committed to the health and well-being of all people in the region -- regardless of their religion, race, or creed. To realize that goal, Society members will develop and maintain communications mechanisms whereby functional dialogues between professional colleagues can occur in tension-free environments.

"We are creating a forum through which one physician from any Middle Eastern nation, descent, or ethnic background can exchange information or ideas with any other physician for the greater good of all Middle East peoples," explains 31-year-old Raz Winiarsky, MD, the Society's founder, who also serves as senior resident in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center. Despite his youth, Dr. Winiarsky possesses a Brahminic knowledge of the extent to which past and current Arab/Israeli tensions affect relationships between those two peoples, including, even, his fellow practitioners within the medical community. "The shared goal of all Society members is to serve humanity," he says, "and, by so doing, we believe we will help further parallel efforts designed to achieve a lasting peace in the Middle East ... and the world."

The Middle East Medical Society, orchestrated by Dr. Winiarsky under the auspices of Penn's Office of International Medicine, will use the Internet as its primary tool for 'real-time' communications between medical colleagues. For example, utilizing the concepts of telemedicine, a physician in Cairo will be able to get immediate on-line help from a colleague in the United States who, presumably because of his/her access to better technologies and treatments, will be able to offer medical/surgical advice. Society members will also have access to a dedicated web-site that will post a variety of medical and scientific articles and updates, as well as Society announcements. In addition to meetings and seminars, the Society will sponsor programs for both physicians and scientists to visit, train, and teach in countries other than their own.

Dr. Winiarsky's passion for creating a sort of global "Grand Rounds" is borne from his personal experiences and first-hand observations. At the age of 10, the Israeli lad and his younger brother were uprooted from their homeland to avoid the effects of war. "My father took us out of our country to protect us," he recalls, "and, like most similarly displaced Israeli Jews, we didn't have much love for Arabs."

After quickly acclimating to a new culture in America, the young boy embarked on a path of academic success to achieve his personal goal -- to become a healer, a physician. In 1985, he entered New York University to begin his undergraduate studies. More importantly, perhaps, he developed a strong friendship with another student -- who, ironically, was a mirror image of himself except that he was an Egyptian Arab. After several conversations, Winiarsky learned that both he and his new friend had been born on the same day ... both had been relocated from their homelands by their fathers, who had fought in their respective armies ... and both had set their sights on becoming physicians. "It was mind-boggling," recalls Winiarsky. "My friend was just like me: we acted alike and we thought alike.

"And then I realized that my father and his father had been trying to kill each other many years earlier, and if they had succeeded, we would never have been born," he adds. "And yet here we were -- sitting across from each other in a college library." For the aspiring physician, this relationship proved an epiphany ... a defining moment in which he realized he must someday find a way to transcend the centuries-old hostilities embedded in the Middle East to try and reach a new plateau of peace through better communication and understanding.

For Dr. Winiarsky, the newly-created Middle East Medical Society is more than an embodiment of his original idea ... it is a sensory and psychosocial extension of all medical professionals who put the preservation of humanity above the more exclusionary concepts of religion and nation. "It is the common goal of all Middle East Medical society members, as well as associated supporters and volunteers, to serve humanity," he says.

The Society's all-day inaugural meeting will be held December 12, at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center. Key medical educators and political representatives will be in attendance, including Dr. William N. Kelley, CEO of the University of Pennsylvania Health System and Dean of the School of Medicine; Dr. Najat Arafat Khelil, National Vice President of the Palestinian American Congress and national President of the Arab Women's Council; Dr. Dan Shanit, Chairman of the Israel Center of Telemedicine and Director of the Cardiovascular Research Unit at the Peres Peace Center; John Wallach, Chairman, Seeds of Peace; and Tina Budnitz and Greg Jaspan, representing Penn School of Medicine's Educational Technology and Information Technology Divisions, respectively.

The meeting will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., in the Conference Room of the Rhoads Pavilion. An afternoon musical interlude will be performed by Ohad Bar-David, representing the 1st Arab-Israeli Orchestra. A cocktail reception and dinner will complete the day's events.