responses, opinions, references

April 2007

To Whom It May Concern:

This is a letter of recommendation for Dr. Oleg Togoyev, who last year helped us with our sons’ pre-adoption medical consultation while we were in Volgograd, Russia.

For over 7 years, my husband and I tried everything to start our own family and nothing seemed to work. We finally came to the conclusion that maybe it wasn’t meant for us to have our own biological child. The more we discussed it, the more we realized our main goal was to have a child to love, that’s when we decided that god had something else in store for us; that was to adopt a child. After months of research, we decided we wanted Happy Families International to help us in our journey, so January 2005 we started the process. By February 2006, we were matched with our son. When we got his picture, he looked absolutely beautiful and the feedback on him was positive, which made us extremely happy. Upon further discussion, even though we were told by Happy Families that the child was healthy, my husband and I realized how important it would be to have our son actually examined by a doctor to make sure, he in fact, was a healthy little boy. That’s when we contacted Happy Families to find out if they knew of a doctor who would come to the orphanage and exam our son.

The following day, Happy Families contacted us and gave us Dr. Oleg Togoyev as a good doctor who would be willing to travel from Moscow to meet us at the orphanage in Volgograd to do our sons examination. When the agency sent us his name, they also sent us a small bio on him. I in-turn e-mailed Dr. Togoyev and asked him to send us additional information on both his background and his accomplishments. Once I received the information, my husband and I began reading about his education, places he had studied and some of his accomplishments. We were thrilled that he had studied in the states and his use of the English language was perfect. The more we read, the more we felt and understood his passion when it came to these children. That’s when we knew we had made the right choice to have Dr. Togoyev do the pre-adoption medical exam on our son. The following day we contacted the agency as well as Dr. Togoyev and told them we definitely wanted him to meet us in Volgograd to do the exam.

Our initial meeting with Dr. Togoyev was pleasant and we were thrilled that he spoke English fluently. He knew what some of our concerns were and he told us he would address them with the Director of the orphanage. After meeting with the Director and being comfortable with the outcome of their meeting, he proceeded with the examination.

When Dr. Togoyev met our son, he was extremely warm and comforting and knew exactly how to communicate with our son to help ease some of his discomfort because he knew our son was a little scared. The reason for this was, majority of the children were brought up in orphanages and (for the most part) never been exposed to males because all the caregivers in the orphanage were women and that’s all they ever saw each day. He was unbelievably thorough in his examination and knew exactly what to look for.

After the physical examination was completed, he also examined our son to see how his motor skills were. By the end of the exam, Dr. Togoyev told us that overall he was extremely pleased with the health of our son. Other than some developmental delays and possible anemia, everything else was good and he was a healthy little boy. We were thrilled by what we heard.

During this visit, the more we talked with Dr. Togoyev and got to know him, the more we realized what a hard-working, caring and dedicated person he truly is. He is a person who invariably understands what the task on hand is and handles it with the utmost graciousness from beginning to end with extreme effectiveness.

Dr. Togoyev seems to be a resourceful, creative and solution-oriented individual who is constantly able to come up with new and innovative approaches to make the adoption process better for families. He made great and valuable suggestions and recommendations to us on things we, as new parents, could do to help our son continue to grow and flourish. He truly is not only a great team player but also a great team leader.

On the personal side, Dr. Togoyev has strong verbal and communication skills. When we met him during our second visit at a Moscow Clinic while my husband and I were going through our physicals, he remembered us and was extremely pleased to see us. He took time from his busy schedule to talk to us and to get some updates on both our son and our adoption process. We could tell that he was highly respected as both an individual and as a professional because of his caring nature.

In closing, based on our experience with Dr. Togoyev, I can unreservedly say that he is a hard working, caring and class act individual who takes pride in what he does and what he hopes to accomplish in the future. I truly would recommend him to any family who is in the adoption process to have their child be examined by him.

Sincerely,
Rosana Carravone