Why Rand Paul is Going to Guatemala

Rand attended the Duke University School of Medicine and became an ophthalmologist and spent 17 years practicing in Kentucky. It is ophthalmology that will take him to Guatemala.

Here's WaPo with the details:

When Congress adjourns for a five-week recess in August, Paul plans to join a medical mission to Guatemala, where he will team up with eye surgeons, nurses and technicians from the University of Utah to visit Salamá, a small manufacturing and commercial center nestled between two mountain ranges 3,000 feet above sea level, north of Guatemala City.

The trip doesn’t play into his political future “in any conscious fashion,” Paul says. But for a presidential hopeful everything matters. The mid-August trip, for example, is also likely to include a small band of aides and reporters. What other potential presidential candidates can say that they have helped the blind see?...

During the trip, Paul plans to reunite with Juan and Andres Hernandez, two men he met 20 years ago. Some of Paul’s close friends brought the then-blind boys from Guatemala to Kentucky in hopes that he could help correct their vision.

“We were never quite certain how much vision they’d get back. But we figured they would get it back because they have nystagmus,” an involuntary and repetitive movement of the eyes, he said. “They were able to get useful vision, or ambulatory vision back. We were excited for them, and we’re excited to see how they’re doing and whether they need anything else.”

The Hernandez brothers were not available for comment. But Judy Schwank and her husband, Bill, who brought the brothers to Kentucky to be treated by Paul, recently reconnected with them in Guatemala and said that they have agreed to the August reunion.

“They still call him Dr. Pablo,” she said.