Meet Uzeyfen, a two-month-old baby boy living in Ethiopia with his parents. Uzeyfen was born with a birth defect known as anorectal malformation. According to our medical partner, African Mission Healthcare Foundation, (AMHF), “Children with this defect have an imperforate anus or they have no opening where the anus should have been. Uzeyfen developed bowel obstruction because of this condition and an emergency colostomy was successfully done when he was four days old.”
Uzeyfen has not yet had the definitive procedure to treat this condition; Posterior sagittal anorectoplasty (PSARP) and colostomy closure. As a result, he cannot pass stool in the normal way. Uzeyfen’s mother is worried about her son because there is a high social stigma against children with this condition.
Although Uzeyfen’s father works hard in a government office to provide for his family, his income is not enough to cover all of the medical procedures that Uzeyfen needs. With a donation of $1,500 we can help Uzeyfen recover without long-term complications from his imperforate anus. He will undergo a PSARP procedure and a colostomy closure. After these two procedures, “Uzeyfen will then be able to pass stool in a normal way,” AMHF says.
“When we were informed there is hope for our baby to get treatment through donors, we were happy and full of hope,” shared Uzeyfen’s parents in their pre-operative interview at AMHF.