The destination was a medical clinic in Papua New Guinea, an island nation off the coast of Australia.

But as they approached, the American doctors encountered a crowd so dense that their vehicles were blocked, so they had to get out and walk the rest of the way.

"Walking up the hill, it was like everybody was reaching out a hand, wanting to touch you, wanting you to touch them, wanting to talk to you, wanting to have you acknowledge them," said Ambridge native Kelly Trapold Dorancott.

It might be normal for a rock star, but not for a physician.

"As we came over the hill, the crowd kind of erupted in cheering," she said, "like we were heroes."

In a way, they are. Dr. Dorancott, an Air Force physician stationed in Hawaii, is serving a tour on the USS Mercy, a hospital ship that visits some of the world's poorest nations to dispense medical care, drugs and advice.

In many cases they can rather easily make a difference, treating problems like tuberculosis, malaria and parasites -- and even more often simply reassuring people that their symptoms are normal, Dr. Dorancott said.

At the Papua New Guinea clinic, she said, she was surprised at how many came in with minor complaints and ordinary issues after waiting in line all night.

"I asked our interpreter about it, and he said, 'They just want to come see the American doctor and have the American doctor tell them they're OK,' " she said.

Other cases are more dramatic, of course. Dr. Dorancott mentioned a Portuguese nun who was working in the Philippines; the medical crew did a CAT scan, found a brain mass, and got her on an airplane back to Portugal for what should be a life-saving operation.

In another heart-warming case, she said, she referred a 14-year-old Filipino boy to the ship for surgery.

"He'd had appendicitis, and his appendix had ruptured," she said. "He ended up with a colostomy" -- meaning that a tube through his abdomen carried his bodily waste to an external bag.

"We sent him to the ship to have his colostomy reversed. It changed his life. Without the surgery he would have had a colostomy for the rest of his life."

It is not always so uplifting, though. There are stark realities to having thousands and thousands of patients and limited resources.

One such case, Dr. Dorancott said, involved an elderly woman, again in the Philippines, who came in with advanced breast cancer. "There was really nothing that we could do," she said. In the states, the doctors could have unleashed the various anti-cancer weapons developed in recent years, but there was no way to do it on the scene.

"Those are cases where you just don't know what to say," Dr. Dorancott said. "They leave, and in the back of your mind you know they're going to die."

She said military training in general helps prepare doctors for such decisions.

"Being in military life, you learn to do as much as you can for as many as you can," she said, while acknowledging that risk is in the job description for soldiers.

She also said the Mercy medical staff has regular "sit-downs" to talk about ethics and the choices they have to make.

But isn't it a little overwhelming to be seen as a savior when you know you're not? "It's not a little overwhelming," Dr. Dorancott said. "It's a lot overwhelming."

A 1990 graduate of Ambridge Area High School, Dr. Dorancott went to Gannon University in Erie then to Hahnemann University in Philadelphia for medical school, paid for by the Air Force.

She's now been on active duty for almost 10 years, and expects to stay in for 10 more. Her husband is a civilian contractor doing computer work, and can go wherever she is stationed.

Dr. Dorancott still has family in Beaver County, though, including her grandmother in Monaca, and visits about once a year.

"Coming from a small community, a lot of times you don't know what else is out there," she said -- which is one reason the USS Mercy is so important. Seven nations take part in Mercy's missions, and civilian care agencies work elbow-to-elbow with military personnel, all to help some of the world's poorest people and to spread the word about the need that exists.

"It's really any opportunity to talk about the fact that this stuff is happening," Dr. Dorancott said.

It is also an opportunity to show the rest of the world what she believes is the true mission of the United States military.

"People think we're here to kill and destroy, that we're out here just to fight wars," she said. "But we're really out here to prevent wars, and to help people who need it."