Finote Selam

THE 12^TH ANNUAL TRIP OF FBIE TO FINOTE SELAM

JANUARY 17-26 2014.

Many people need help - old or young, man or woman, religious or irreligious... We believe that God is the ultimate answer for all problems but we also believe that there is a role we can play as humans, as professionals, as Christians!

FBIE is taking a step towards helping people suffering from sight related problems.

The 2014 mission of the FBIE was to the north-western part of  Ethiopia to a place called Finote Selam, to give the gift of sight to rural Ethiopian farmers. A team of eleven people from dedicated eye specialist doctors and highly qualified ophthalmic nurses have given their time and skills to help those helpless people in Finote Selam, Ethiopia. 

About 85% of people in Ethiopia live in rural areas. Most of them have no access to primary eye care anywhere near them.  The people of Finote Selam are not any different from the rest, maybe even more affected with various eye diseases.

Even although we were there to help and treat patients who suffer from blindness due to cataracts, to see these people like sand on the seashore, with so many kinds of eye diseases, it was heart-breaking to have to send multitudes away without any form of help.  As the necessary screening of patients had not been done prior to our arrival, that also caused yet more time-consuming delays.  For the first two days, two of the doctors had to spend their time screening instead of operating on those really desperate to have their sight restored.

We faced another problem this time: one of the microscopes we took with us specifically to make it possible to treat the maximum number of patients was confiscated at Customs. With it a further 75 people at least would have been able to have their lives changed by having their sight restored.  All in all, we managed to operate on 254 patients in an average of four operating sessions. 

There is no more satisfying thing in earth than to see people coming out of darkness into the bright light of day. On average, these people have been blind between 5-7 years. One of the great highlights of this trip for me was not the great number of people who were treated, wonderful as that was, but what happened on our last day there at about 4:30pm, when a young man of 28 came crying for help "please help me brighten my dark life".

Kassaie Atalay

We had decided to call it a day, and some of the staff had already started to pack up our equipment. I went over to him, and saw that he had bilateral cataracts. I spoke to one of the doctors and suggested we operate on him. He had one of his eyes operated, and everyone was moved by his story: he had been a beggar living on the streets. Some of our nurses gave him some foods and clothing.

The following morning we went to see those who had been operated on on the Friday, including this poor young man. Well! When we removed the dressing from his eye, his face was shining like the morning sun!  His life had started changing, and it was wonderful to see the smile on his face as for the first time in his life maybe  he could look and see what was going on around him. To me, this was one of the highlights of the achievements of FBIE. We would like to meet him when we return to the area, and maybe next time restore the sight in his other eye.

On this mission, after calculation of all the expenses involved, it is estimated that the cost per patient treated worked out at £86.75. Can I just finish by saying how grateful FBIE is for your donations to this life-changing work. So far, approximately 2,355 people have been enabled to return to farming or whatever other occupation they had been doing.

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