“I couldn’t see anything. I could not walk independently. Now I can see and walk on my own,” said Princess William , 20, just a day after undergoing treatment at a cataract surgery camp organized in Pleebo in mid-November last year by the PakMed Level 2 Hospital in Harper. “I am thankful to God and to the Pakistani doctors who did that to me.”

According to eye surgeon Maj Farooq Ahmed, the young woman lost her vision due to premature cataract formation from an inflammation in both eyes. The hospital organized the free cataract eye surgery programme for the local community with Maj. Farooq operating on the patients assisted by fellow medics Nasir and Zahid. The team also included John Cooper from the eye care unit at JJ Dossen Hospital.
 

The initiative was an offshoot of an earlier medical camp in October 2012 during which PakMed observed that many people in the area were losing their vision to cataract, a condition in which the natural lens of the eye gets opaque. The condition is curable with surgery. At that camp, surgery was recommended for such patients but, with no eye surgeon in the whole of Maryland County, the only options left was to travel to Monrovia or wait indefinitely for an eye surgeon to come to town.

Because many do not have the means to seek treatment in Monrovia, PakMed Commanding Officer Lt.-Col. Rab Nawaz Khan arranged the three-day free surgery programme for the local community. “Our presence here should bring some benefit and comfort to the host community,” Khan told UNMIL Today.

The programme was carried out with support from JJ Dossen Hospital which not only provided intraocular lenses for the surgery but also accommodated the patients for one to two days after the procedure. All patients responded well to the surgery and showed significant improvement in their vision. They all expressed gratitude to the PakMed Level 2 Hospital for its assistance.