4-year-old Cameroon boy can see again, thanks to Holon ophthalmologists

With no suitable medical facilities for such an operation in Cameroon, the authorities in the poor African country decided to send him to Israel.

By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH
A four-year-old named Salin found in an abandoned sewage canal in Cameroon has had his sight restored by two doctors at the Wolfson Medical Center in Holon. The head of the ophthalmology department at the central hospital in Yaounde, Cameroon's capital, recently contacted Dr. Itamar Yeshurun and Dr. Hagai Avizemer of the Holon hospital and asked for help with the child. He was blind in one eye and had only minimal sight in the other because his corneas had turned opaque. It was decided that the doctors would operate on the blind eye so as not to risk his remaining vision in the other. With no suitable medical facilities for such an operation in Cameroon, the authorities in the poor African country decided to send him to Israel. In a new technique, the boy's opaque cornea was removed and a new cornea transplanted in its stead. The cornea was donated by the Vision Share cornea bank in the US and facilitated by Vivienne Notman, its representative in Israel. In addition, healthy tissue from the less-damaged eye was transplanted into the severely damaged eye to improve its surface. Immediately after the surgery, Salin's vision greatly improved, and he returned home. Two months ago, when Yeshurun traveled to Cameroon to perform a cataract operation on a baby, he examined Salin and found that the boy was seeing well and functioning as a happy, normal child. The Israeli ophthalmologists have plans to transplant a cornea on the other eye as well.