Lucky little bump

Pok, a 4-yr old boy from Cambodia, undergoes treatment for a cranial malformation Jan 20 2012 at KK Women's and Childrens Hospital.Pok has a catheter that drains excess fluid from his skull as his cranial bone graft heals.

A photograph taken of Pok, a 4-yr old boy from Cambodia, before his treatment for a cranial malformation at KK Women's and Childrens Hospital. Image Courtesy of Jane Marsden.

A photograph taken of Pok, a 4-yr old boy from Cambodia, before his treatment for a cranial malformation at KK Women's and Childrens Hospital. Image Courtesy of Jane Marsden.

Jan 22, 2012
By Paul Gilfeather principal correspondent
todayonsunday@mediacorp.com.sg (Singapore)

Pok's little hand is almost completely covered in bandages, but the mischievous little patient of Ward 55 is keen to play and slips it inside the bag of his Singapore carer.

He takes out a shiny silver necklace and, quick as flash, drops it over his tiny head. Local businesswoman and volunteer Jane Marsden simply laughs. "He loves the bling," she says.

It has only been a few days since the brave four-year-old underwent major brain surgery on Monday. But his spirit remains indomitable. The Cambodian orphan, also known as "Little Pickle", is a very lucky boy indeed.

Abandoned by his parents at six months old, Pok is now recovering from a life-changing operation at Singapore's KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH). He was born with a birth defect called Congenital Ethmoidal Encephalocele. It meant his skull had never closed properly and part of his brain protruded from his forehead in a sac covered by skin.

Unfortunately, the abnormality is seen way too often among South-east Asia's young, particularly in Cambodia, and without this surgery Pok's long-term health would have been seriously threatened. His mental and physical development was already hampered, and the condition made it difficult for him to see out of his left eye. He was also vulnerable to infections, including meningitis.

The neuro- and plastic surgeons who treated Pok did the work for free as part of the KK Regional Outreach to Kids Fund, which since 2002 has helped more than 100 disadvantaged youngsters from Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, Myanmar and China.

A TINY TORNADO

The four-year-old's full name is Roath Bopha Pok: Roath meaning orphan in the Khmer language, Bopha for the name of the hospital where he was left by his mother, and Pok, meaning bump. "The doctors named him," says Mrs Marsden. "It's not much of a name, but he doesn't seem to mind."

For the moment, Pok looks like the happiest little boy in the world, radiating the warmth and love gifted to him by the dozens of grown-ups from the orphanage, the hospital and in Singapore. Among the other young patients in the ward, he is a tiny tornado of fun, in possession of a cheeky smile which melts the heart.

Mrs Marsden, who owns and runs a swim school, is one of several Singaporean residents who volunteer regularly at the Kais Children's Village in Cambodia, where the youngster lives. She first met Pok, who is among 20 special-needs children to be taken in by the centre, when he was only a baby.

Speaking from Pok's bedside at the KK Hospital, she told Today on Sunday: "He is a real character and you can see why it was so easy for us to fall in love with him and want to help him. We have been going over for several years to do swim camps and, although he is only five this May, he was always first in the pool, always first to take part.

"We became aware of his condition because he had a much bigger bump on his forehead before, and we tried to get him some treatment in Cambodia, but the doctors said they could not do anything for him.

"I searched the Web for information on the condition and discovered that KKH specialised in these operations - it had actually done 13 of them. And so I just emailed the hospital on the off chance that they would do it and, incredibly, they said 'yes'."

"The doctors have told us that the treatment will dramatically help his long-term prospects. He was also under threat of blindness, but it also looks like we've caught that in time."

HELPING HANDS

As Pok plays with his plastic building blocks and toy car, he seems completely unaware of the tube attached to his head which allows fluid to drain from the affected brain area. When he decides to take flight, Mrs Marsden has to give chase, in close pursuit with the plastic jar which collects the excess liquid.

"He loves playing with other kids," she continued. "Many of the children at the orphanage are unlikely to be adopted because of their various conditions, so we rely on sponsorship to keep the place going. It doesn't receive any aid from the government either."

The KK outreach programme tries each year to raise about S$500,000 in order to bring up to a dozen children to Singapore for treatment, ranging from complex heart conditions to malformations of the face. Associate Professor Anette Jacobsen, clinical director of the hospital's international medical programme, said the fund "helps children from the region with complex conditions that require a high level of surgical expertise not available in their home country".