Mohammad Awwad, Talfeet, June 2011

Mohammad Awwad is a nine year old child from the village of Talfeet, near Nablus, who lives with his parents two brothers and four sisters.

Though close to the city of Nablus, the residents of Talfeet are prohibited from reaching it because of a main checkpoint that separates Nablus from all its surrounding villages. In addition, the villagers of Talfeet suffer from water constraints that disenable them from growing anything that they might generate income from. As a consequence, Talfeet is a poor village.

Mohammad was brought to our Outreach Clinic for a checkup by his father. Mohammad was born with congenital cataract in both eyes and was given a bilateral lensectomy when he was very young. A few years later he developed glaucoma and a bilateral trabeculectomy was done in order to control the intraocular pressure, or the pressure of the fluid inside the eye.

*Mohammad Awwad

Primary congenital, or infantile, glaucoma is elevated intraocular pressure that, ordinarily, occurs in about 1 out of 10,000 births. It results in blindness in approximately 10% of cases and reduced vision (worse than 20/50) in about half of all cases. Unfortunately, prevalence is much higher in cultures with consanguinity – such as that of the Palestinian people.

Unfortunately, in Mohammad’s case, his intraocular pressure remained high despite surgery and he must use antiglaucoma drops to control his disease.

After examination by our Team, the pressure in Mohammad’s right eye was found to be unacceptably high and it transpired that the Awwads had not been able to afford to buy the drops their son.

From our Outreach medicine supply, we were able to supply Mohammad with the drops he needed there and then – and he was referred to the Jerusalem Hospital for further investigation and treatment.

We were able to assure Mr Awwad that, through our Patient Relief Fund, we would be able to help Mohammad to get his drops.