(WHTM) – Former Pennsylvania U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz says he’s traveled to Turkey after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake left more than 47,000 people dead.

Oz, the former television doctor who has dual citizenship with Turkey, posted images on social media visiting a pediatric ward in Adana, the Hatay Greater City Hospital, and meeting with rescue crews.

Oz has previously visited refugee camps on both sides of the Turkish and Syrian border and asked for donations through the International Federation of Red Cross to help those affected by the earthquake

Search teams and aid poured into Turkey and Syria on Tuesday as rescuers working in freezing temperatures and sometimes using their bare hands dug through the remains of buildings flattened by a powerful earthquake.

The magnitude 7.8 quake and a cascade of strong aftershocks cut a swath of destruction that stretched hundreds of kilometers (miles) across southeastern Turkey and neighboring Syria. The shaking toppled thousands of buildings and heaped more misery on a region wracked by Syria’s 12-year civil war and refugee crisis. One temblor that followed the first registered at magnitude 7.5, powerful in its own right.

Turkey is home to millions of refugees from the war. The affected area in Syria is divided between government-controlled territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, where millions live in extreme poverty and rely on humanitarian aid to survive.

The Associated Press has contributed to this report