Meet Abdullah Al Rabeeah a Saudi surgeon who broke record in separating conjoined twins
Taha Sakr
The US based TV Channel of ABC News has published a detailed report on the famous Saudi surgeon Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Rabeeah, who spent part of his life in the surgery to separate conjoined twins, one of the most complex surgeries in the world.
The ABC report said that Al Rabeeah had performed 48 separations for twins’ surgeries, noting that no surgeon has performed this number of surgeries.
Over the past 30 years, Abdullah Al Rabeeah, a pediatric surgeon and advisor to the Saudi Royal Court, has led a program to separate conjoined twins born to poor families from around the world.
In November, he successfully completed the 48th surgery on conjoined twins, Ahmed and Mohamed, from Libya, according to the Saudi channel of Al-Arabyia.
(Al Rabeeah Twins Separation Program), located at the King Abdullah Specialist Hospital for Children in Riyadh, receives much of its funding from Islamic and royal charities, according to ABC report.
The report added that each twin separation surgery is receiving approval from Saudi King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
”We are paying for travel and other expenses,” Al Rabeeah told ABC News, noting that the program is receiving patients from 21 countries.
“These surgeries have nothing to do with geography, religion or politics. They are based on science and humanity” he asserted.
Al Rabeeah conducted his first twins’ separation surgery in the early 1990s and his practice grew, he held positions within the Saudi government, serving as Minister of Health and Director of the King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Relief, according to the report.
As his public services increased, he still had time for his medical program for conjoined twins.
“”Even when I was minister of health, I continued to have surgery because I believe that even if you do this over the weekend, it is something that can help people ” he said.
He said his program had separated nearly 100 patients, and 90 of them were still living by 2019
The report notes that conjoined twins are rare, according to researchers from the University of Minnesota, this phenomenon exists only in about 1 in 200,000 births, it is high in Southeast Asia and Africa, where the rate is 1 out of 25,000.
