In 1979, after the provincial government had donated land, construction work for the SOS Children's Village Dhodial, Mansehra District (North-West Frontier Province), started, and it was completed in 1982. The SOS Children's Village is located near the small city of Dhodial in Mansehra District, in a highland valley which is surrounded by mountains up to 3,500 metres high. Dhodial is situated approximately 80 km north of the city of Islamabad, the country's capital.
The SOS Children's Village Dhodial consists of 14 family houses, a community centre and several other buildings, among them a small workshop. The focal point of the SOS Children's Village is the beautiful playground. After modification work in the administrative block of the SOS Children's Village, the SOS Vocational Training Centre for older girls went into operation in March 1995. An SOS Youth Facility for boys who are undergoing their vocational training or secondary and higher education was established in the neighbouring town of Abottabad. An orchard and a vegetable garden have also been laid out to cater for the SOS Children's Village's own needs. A poultry farm, which is run by the older children, has proved very successful.
The SOS Children's Village attaches much importance to its contact with the neighbourhood, and the SOS Hermann Gmeiner School, which was inaugurated in 1993 and expanded to a secondary school in 1997, offers places to many destitute children from the surroundings. At Pattan, an SOS Medical Centre was established by the end of 1997. This mother and child clinic was run by the country's authorities from 1983 to 1999. Then it was closed. Since there is an urgent need for this clinic, SOS decided to take over and re-open it in 2001.