Renowned Saudi surgeon Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah participated in an intellectual symposium on his successful and inspiring career in an interesting lecture recently held at the University of Medicine in Sousse, Tunisia. The lecture was an inspiring lesson full of energy and advice, and when Al-Rabeeah spoke, everyone fell silent in the presence of culture, science, knowledge, and humility.
Dr. Al-Rabeeah, who has spent part of his life performing one of the most complex operations in the world, has performed around 100 twin separations, and no other surgeon has performed so many operations.
For more than 40 years, Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabiah, a pediatric surgeon and advisor to the Saudi Royal Court, has led a program to separate conjoined twins born to impoverished families from around the world.
“Based on science and humanity”
Al-Rabeeah’s twin separation program, located at King Abdullah Children’s Specialty Hospital in Riyadh, receives much of its funding from Islamic and royal charities. Saudi Arabia’s King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approve each individual twin separation operation.
In his inspirational lecture, after sharing a video of his most important operations, Al-Rabeeah said: “These operations have nothing to do with geography, religion or politics, they are based on science and humanity.”
“Even when I was minister of health, I continued to perform surgeries because I believe that even if I do it on weekends, this is something that (can) help people, humanity is part of the medicine,” Al-Rabeeah said.
A video aired during the lecture: Conjoined twins are rare, according to researchers from the University of Minnesota, the phenomenon is only found in about 1 in 200,000 births. Incidents are higher in Southeast Asia and Africa, where the rate is 1 in 25,000.
The story of the Libyan twins
One of the most touching stories of twin separation is that of Libyan twins Ahmed and Mohamed
Their journey to Riyadh began with an email. After the twins’ family learned before they were born that the brothers would be conjoined even though they considered an abortion, the parents decided to continue the pregnancy for a while.
On June 26, Ahmed and Mohamed were born by Caesarean section in a small Libyan hospital. The brothers were conjoined at the abdomen, pelvis, third leg, intestines and urinary organs.
Libyan doctors told the twins’ parents that no one in war-torn Libya could perform the risky separation surgery.
The parents began searching through traditional and social media, and then the twins’ father found Al-Rabeeah’s program online.
Al-Rabeeah said their father wrote to him saying he had twins and was looking for any country to help them. “So I responded immediately and asked him to provide me with details and reports,” he said.
After reviewing their records with his colleagues, they decided to help the family, Al-Rabeeah said. They presented the case to the crown prince, who “immediately directed me to bring them and informed that the government would fully fund them.”
After arriving in Riyadh, completing the procedures and starting the operation, and after the successful operation, which lasted approximately more than 15 hours at that point, the parents were informed, and they could see it live.
After more than three and a half hours, the twins were moved from the operating room to the intensive care unit. The operation was successful and both are now recovering. Once the surgery was over, Al-Rabeeah allowed the parents to walk to the room.
He (the twins’ father) came and tried to kiss my hand. I refused, and then he hugged me.
After the twins were moved to the intensive care unit, Al-Rabeeah left the hospital to go home. He said his family prepared a celebratory dinner for him.
Ahmed and Mohammed’s procedures were the 48th conjoined twin operation performed by Al-Rabeeah.
Al-Rabeeah reported that the longest separation took 23 hours straight.
About Dr. Rabeeah :
Dr. Abdullah Rabeeah was born in Makkah in 1955, and Dr. Rabia lived an innocent childhood, full of stories that contributed to his foundation, and the formation of his dream; In his youth, Dr. Rabeeah suffered a fall from the top of his bicycle, which led to the splitting of his head, and the treating doctor had to sew the wound, it is of course painful to do so without anesthesia, but Dr. Rabeeah father encouraged him, telling him that he would become a surgeon, and treat patients without pain.
With those words, Dr. Rabeeah’s dream was formed from a young age, he was a very diligent and brilliant student, in the elementary stage of education, and when he reached the middle school, his thinking as a whole began to center his hope and ambition, to become a surgeon doctor, treating patients without pain, as his father promised him, and helping them to bring pleasure to their hearts, as medicine from his point of view is a very noble and uplifting profession.
With the beginning of this dream, which took clear and serious steps in order to achieve it, Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah worked hard, and his adolescence passed peacefully, and no one complained to his parents about that stage, which many parents are concerned about towards their children, as Abdullah Al-Rabeeah was the owner of a goal and a clear plan that he wants to implement.
Dr. Abdullah Al- Rabeeah as soon as he finished the secondary education stage, until the Almighty honored him with the first steps to achieve his dream; which is his enrollment to study medicine at the university, and Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah was not an ordinary student, but wanted excellence until the last moments, so he climbed throughout his years of study at the Faculty of Medicine, and obtained the first place in his class throughout the years of study.
Like others who studied medicine, Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah left the Kingdom, heading to central Canada in order to complete his medical studies and obtain a master’s degree from the finest and best Canadian universities, a journey that took five consecutive years of his life, during which he was away from his small family and his homeland as well.
The journey took him away from his young family and his homeland for five consecutive years, during which he combined his love for children, and the art of surgery as he describes it; where he specialized in pediatric surgery, but everything has a price, and the price that Dr. Rabia paid was the grumbling of his little daughter for his absence from them, and her request to her mother to buy her a substitute father who can spend more time with her.
Of course, Dr. Rabeeah felt he was failing his children, but he always believed that how he spent time with his children was more important than the number of hours he spent with them.
Indeed, Dr. Rabeeah made his decision to return to the Kingdom, but what preoccupied him was how to return the favor, to this country that gave him all his knowledge, and made him a role model in the medical community, as Dr. Rabia was the only surgeon in the Kingdom, specializing in pediatric surgery, and did not care much about the salary or money, or the comfort and good and luxurious life in Canada.
Dr. Rabeeah specialized in surgeries to separate Siamese twins, which gave him a distinguished fame, Arab and international, and the most important international news agencies talked about him; referring to the Arab Muslim doctor who does not differentiate between patients, whether they are Muslims or Christians; where Christian parents turned to him to separate their twins, after many churches refused to sponsor them with the cost of the surgery, and Dr. Al-Rabia provided them with all the required support and the parents surrendered after that.
Dr. Al-Rabeeah held a number of administrative positions in the Kingdom, but he did not move away from his practice of medicine, as it is the distinguished dream, which his father told him in his youth, and he sought, thanks to God, to achieve it, and it is worth mentioning that Dr. Abdullah Muhammad Al-Rabeeah has served as an advisor at the Royal Court, and as head of the Specialized Hospital in Riyadh.
TunisianMonitorOnline (Douha Saafi – English NejiMed )
