Twenty Years Ago Today. A Vision of Hope

 

Twenty years ago today, this article was published about a surgery I performed on a two-year-old girl named Alaa, a child blinded by war. Shrapnel from an American tank shell—fired on a children’s birthday party mistaken for an insurgent gathering—killed most of her cousins and family members. It left Alaa with a torn abdomen and filled her eyes with metal fragments that would rust and poison her ocular tissue.

At the time, a local law student, Ashley Severance, contacted me at my private practice, asking if I could help. The surgeon originally scheduled to remove Alaa’s eyes had backed out—fearful, in that post-9/11 era, that saving this child might be seen as aiding the enemy rather than helping a fellow human being.

I knew I had to try. If it were my child, I would want someone to do everything possible. father told me, “It’s not fair that a young child will never get to see her mother again.” He was told to let her die—her wounds were too severe, and resources scarce—but he found a truck and drove her over 200 miles through an active war zone to find someone willing to close her abdomen.

I pressured the hospital where I usually operated to give me OR time. They agreed—but only on the condition that their name not be mentioned, fearing armed protests. The local pediatric and anesthesia teams, as well as my operating room staff, all volunteered their time. The pediatric surgeons declined to close her abdomen, unwilling to get involved, but I later found a surgeon in California who completed that part of her care.

Over two intense days, I worked with unwavering precision, removing each shard and sealing each wound with a laser. It was painstaking, delicate work—ten hours of surgery, knowing that every moment mattered. I did what I could, but in the end, I could only hope.

Then, the moment came. When we placed glasses on her face, she reached for blocks and began to play. In that instant, all the exhaustion, all the uncertainty melted away.

I cannot take credit for what happened. I was simply the surgeon they found to help. Ashley worked tirelessly to bring Alaa here, alongside fellow law students who translated and cared for the family. They partnered with wartime photographer Alan Pogue, whose book No More Victims documented the children and limbs lost to war—those labeled as collateral damage. They fought through red tape, navigated impossible odds, and gave this child a chance at a future.

There are patients and cases a surgeon never forgets. Even now, two decades later, I carry this with me. The power of medicine, the resilience of a child, and the heartbreaking reality that no scalpel can erase the tragedies of war, or the stupidity of men that make it inevitable.

Note: The article remains a valid account of that time, though I am no longer married. In the photo you can see the shrapnel wounds to the face and eye, and the white cataracts and retinal detachments from retained intraocular shrapnel.