Homecoming: No longer the ‘six-legged baby’, parents name child Mohammad Ahmed

Boy returns home after less than a week of his surgery to remove extra limbs.


Sarfaraz Memon April 26, 2012

SUKKUR:


Only two-weeks old, the baby boy who was born with extra limbs from a conjoined twin returned to his parents’ home in Sukkur on Tuesday, after undergoing a successful surgery in Karachi.


The parents of the baby, following his much awaited homecoming, named him Mohammed Ahmed. Customarily newborn babies are named on the sixth day but due to his unique situation, Ahmed’s parents had decided to postpone the ceremony.

“It is very difficult to express my feelings,” said Ahmed’s father, Imran Shaikh, while talking to The Express Tribune at his home situated in Shaikh Muhalla, Ayub Gate Sukkur on Wednesday. “I could only pray while standing in the corridor of the National Institute of Child Health (NICH) as my week-old baby boy underwent a critical operation to get rid of the extra limbs.” Ahmed was born in the Sukkur Civil Hospital on April 13 with extra limbs which the doctors said belonged to his conjoined twin.

The Baitul Maal Pakistan managing director (MD), Zamarud Khan, took notice of the boy’s condition and directed the organisation’s district officer, Shabbir Memon, to make arrangements for shifting Ahmed to NICH Karachi. After reaching Karachi on April 15, Ahmed was admitted at the NICH and his surgery took place on April 19.

“The operation took four hours, but those hours felt like an eternity to me,” said Shaikh, while looking at his son with unconcealed joy on his face. “My mother and wife were in Sukkur and kept calling to check up while I kept stopping every doctor and nurse coming out of the operation theatre for information.”

The moment of relief could not have come sooner after all the waiting, said Shaikh. “When the doctor came out of the operation theatre and congratulated me on a successful operation, I breathed a sigh relief and thanked Allah.”

He thanked the media for highlighting his son’s case which caught the attention of the Baitul-Maal MD. Besides giving a cheque of Rs600,000 to the hospital management, Shaikh said that the Baitul-Maal director, Dr Adnan Majeed, also handed him a cheque for Rs50,000 for expenses. A Rs50,000 cheque was also given to Shaikh by the Pakistan Peoples Party MNA, Nauman Islam, who visited Ahmed at the NICH on April 18 and also promised Shaikh a government job.

Ahmed was discharged on Tuesday evening and reached home on Wednesday in a NICH ambulance. The boy reportedly has some problem in his stomach and the doctors have advised the parents to bring him after six weeks for necessary checkup and additional treatment if required.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 26th, 2012.

COMMENTS (5)

ujala noor | 11 years ago | Reply

antebellum yeah true in our Religion (Islam) we named baby on the 6th day..May ALLAH bless this baby and pakistan as well that we have such modern technology which made this operation successful.

Junaid | 11 years ago | Reply

Alhamdulillah

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