News / Cases

£10 per month by standing order would greatly help improve the quality of life of many young Africans needing plastic surgery.

Emmanuel (click image to enlarge)
Emmanuel lives in Buduburam refugee camp for Liberians who fled the civil war that ravaged their country. His mother and sisters were killed and his life made more miserable by taunts directed to his facial deformity.

The Plastic Surgery Unit in Accra could have performed the surgery necessary to repair his cleft but everyone in Ghana, no matter their circumstances, has to pay for this and Emmanuel had no funding.

However by good fortune a visitor to Ghana from the USA met Emmanuel, alerted the RPSB of his need and we were able to give him a new start in life in November 2002 by repairing his cleft. There are many hundreds of children in Ghana like Emmanuel whose clefts could be repaired with your help.

Isatou (click image to enlarge)
Isatou is a young girl from the Gambia whose legs were badly burned in an accident at home. She urgently requires surgery that in West Africa is only available at the Burns & Plastic Surgery Unit in Ghana.

The longer she awaits surgery, the greater the development of contracture in her legs. Her movements are already impaired and she can no longer run about playing with her friends. If this remains untreated she will lose the use of her legs and will develop major knee, hip and back problems.

Isatou could be helped but, as yet, there is no money to pay for her transport and treatment that would cost around £800.

Amekoudi (click image to enlarge)
Amekoudi is a young man from Togo, the country immediately to the east of Ghana. Unfortunately he is an albino and African albinos are ravaged by skin cancer.

In 2002 Amekoudi was brought from Togo where no treatment is available and major surgery preformed to remove much of his cancers and reconstruct his wounds. Someone in Scotland paid for his treatment and his transport back home. He wrote to us in Scotland in 2003 telling us how this help had changed and brought new hope into his life. We heard nothing more but after a year were able to track him down in Togo, sent a pickup to the border, brought him to the RSPB Unit in Accra and removed 57 lesions from his body.

Unfortunately, although the worst of his cancer has been removed, recurrence is inevitable. To make Amekoudi's life as fruitful, fulfilling and pain free as possible around £300 is required annually to bring him to Ghana from Togo for more surgery, medication and to maintain his spirit and ability to survive.

John Botrey (click image to enlarge)
John is a cheerful young man whose face and head have been ravaged by the tropical disease, Noma. Noma is a gangrene-type condition that starts with a mouth ulcer and rapidly proceeds to destroy flesh and bone.

He was lucky to survive as 450,000 of the half million, mainly children, who contract the disease annually in sub Saharan Africa die very quickly from it. Like the few other Noma survivors John was seriously disfigured, was unable to speak, eat or breathe normally and was treated as a social outcast.

His facial reconstruction would be both time consuming and would require very special skills. In Europe this would cost £30,000. The plastic surgeons in Ghana could do it helped by volunteer specialists sent out from the UK by the charity. However, this will only happen if £1,500 is raised to pay for his surgical and hospital costs.

Since this was written John's life has been transformed by several operations carried out in the Plastic Surgery Unit in Accra. More on John Botrey can be found in Section 3 - Conditions.

Please help Emmanuel, Isatou, Amekoudi, John and many others by using the online donation form.