The closure of the Mount of David hospital in January 1995 ended the medical care for hundreds of children with club feet, dislocated hips and other congenital bone disorders, area surgeons say.
Some children were in the middle of extensive treatment programs when Children International officials announced they were shuttering the free, state-of-the-art facility because of budgetary woes and political instability.
A hospital doctor wrote to Children International’s chief executive, Joseph Gripkey, asking if the charity would pay for the surgeries still needed by certain children.
“If we applied the cast, we should pay to remove it,” Gripkey replied in March 1995. “We will not, however, pay for additional surgery after the cast is removed.”
Gripkey directed his staff to refer the children to other facilities “as soon as possible.” He wrote: “JUST DO IT!”
Treating the children was difficult, area doctors say, because the Kansas City-based charity did not release their medical records.
Some of the children never found a doctor their families could afford.
Siham Fraij Zawahreh, 6, scurries across the ravines separating the tents and corrugated tin shacks where her family camps on a mountainside north of Jericho.
Several years ago, Children International doctors diagnosed Siham with two dislocated hips. They operated on her left hip in March 1994, and removed the wires from that hip in August 1994. But then the hospital closed. Siham “needs another operation on the right side,” a March 1995 hospital memo said. But that surgery “will be considered a new procedure,” and so Children International would not pay for it, the memo said.
Since then, no work has been done on Siham’s right hip, her family said. “We have no information on what to do. Nobody ever told us anything,” said her grandfather Mohamed Zawahreh, 65.
Siham often implores her parents to “please do the operation.” Her 25-year-old mother, Mariam Zawahreh, only says, “If we have the money, we will.”
Fadda Daoud Amar, 6, was promised full treatment at the Mount of David hospital, her family said. But when the hospital closed, charity officials ruled that her upcoming surgeries were new procedures rather than a continuation of care, and so her case was deemed “not applicable at the mission expense,” a hospital memo shows.
Hospital surgeons had operated to realign Fadda’s right hip, but the facility closed before they could operate on the left. After the closure, “the hospital didn’t say anything,” said her mother, Kifaya Jaib Amar, 27. “We tried to go back three or four times but we would find it closed, so we have to leave.”
Fadda was fortunate enough to have the surgery at Hussein Hospital in Bethlehem in late 1995, with her family paying through private insurance.
Ala’ Mansour Es-Sous, 8, had two dislocated hips. Her parents have only praise for the care she received at Mount of David. Luckily, time was on the child’s side. She had surgery in June 1993 to repair the left hip, and in February 1994 to reattach the right. The family had time to bring Ala’ Mansour back to the hospital for follow-up visits before it closed. The pins in her leg from the second operation were removed in Nablus, but the family never had to pay anything, said her mother, Faidah Mansour Es-Sous, 28.
“Thank God everything is OK with her. She runs and walks normally,” said Es-Sous, beaming. The 2nd-grader loves to dance and enjoys studying math and Arabic.
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“We’re happy with the care she received. We are really satisfied.”