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 A case of the measles when she was just 6 months old left Jarai Bah nearly
blind, with the corneas in both eyes scarred white.
Now 7, the Sierra Leone native has regained much of her vision in one eye and
some of her brown eye color thanks to two free surgeries performed by an
ophthalmologist at Washington Adventist Hospital in Takoma Park and orchestrated
by a relative living in the United States.
"We are so happy now," said Juldeh Bah, Jarai's mother, who has been in the
country for seven months with her daughter.
Last May, in the first operation, Stephen Ginsberg transplanted a new cornea
into Jarai's right eye, improving her vision from between 20-200 and 20-400 to
between 20-80 and 20-100, he said. He also removed white scar tissue. She has no
vision in her left eye, but in a second procedure Feb. 6, Ginsberg straightened
the muscles behind that eye to keep it from drifting, as happens after years
without use, and injected it with dye to improve its color.
Early in the decade, a civil war in Sierra Leone forced Jarai's parents to
flee with Jarai and her older brother to neighboring Guinea. There, Jarai
contracted measles and suffered corneal scarring, in which transparent tissue
that covers the eye and lets in light becomes dried and covered in white scar
tissue. Corneal scarring is the most common cause of childhood blindness.
When the family returned to Sierra Leone, doctors were unable to help Jarai
and, at first, wrongly diagnosed cataracts.
"We never had a good doctor to take care of her," said Juldeh Bah. Without
proper medical treatment, it seemed unlikely that Jarai's condition would ever
improve.
But last year, the family was visited by Henry Sloe, a cousin of Jarai's
father, who left Sierra Leone in 1996 and lives in Glenn Dale in Prince George's
County. Sloe said he would find a way to help.
When he returned to the United States, Sloe approached Ginsberg, a resident
at Somerset House, a condominium complex in Chevy Chase where Sloe is director
of operations. Ginsberg specializes in corneal transplants.
"He said, 'If you can get her here, I'll do the surgery,' " Sloe recalled.
Getting Jarai and her mother to the United States took some work, Sloe said,
but he secured a humanitarian visa with the help of a lawyer and congressional
staffer who lived at Somerset. Residents at Somerset donated more than $11,000
for airfare and expenses, said Sloe, who has housed Jarai and her mother for the
past seven months.
On Feb. 6, the day of the second surgery, Jarai, her mother and Sloe sat in a
waiting room at Washington Adventist, where they are now well known to the
staff.
Jarai, a shy girl who has been attending first grade at Glenn Dale Elementary
School, simply shook her head when asked if she was scared.
"When she first arrived, she was probably 10 pounds thinner than she is now,
and she's tiny now," Ginsberg said. "When I first walked into the room, she was
timid. She wouldn't even look at me, and they had to prod her to say hello."
This time, when Ginsberg walked into the waiting room in his scrubs, Jarai
walked up and gave him a hug.
After the surgery, Ginsberg said the corneal scar turned out to be too strong
for the dye to be injected properly. He said he would like to fit Jarai with a
plastic prosthetic shell that would cover the scar.
Jarai's mother said that she is glad someone has been able to help her
daughter, and that she is thankful to everyone.
Although she's been separated from her husband and 12-year-old son for more
than seven months, Juldeh Bah said the journey has been worth it.
"It's not hard at all," she said. "For my daughter, I would do anything to be
sure she'd be okay."
Sierra
Leonean Child Gets a Medical Gift in Montgomery - washingtonpost.com
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