Three of the SAWA Board members.

In 2001, Dr. House was approached by the Syrian-American Women's Association (SAWA). They knew that there were many deaf children in Syria, and they knew that Dr. House might have a way to help these children.

Dr. Kamal Batniji, a Jordanian-American, helped Dr. House put together a truly international team, consisting of Dr. Mona Mourad (an Egyptian physician- audiologist), Dr. Steven Parnes (an eminent Jewish otolaryngologist from New York), and Ms. Badria Fadda (a skilled surgical nurse who works with Dr. Batniji).

Efforts such as this demonstrate our common humanity. Deafness knows no borders, and has no politics.

(Adults, l-r) Dr. Mona Mourad, Ms. Sawsan Kosi, Dr. Kamal Batniji, Dr. William House, Dr. Steven Parnes, Dr. Mazan Hamidi. (Children, l-r: 8 of the original 9 patients) Luema, Aia, Inana, Muhammad, Mourad (behind Muhammad), Majd, Hiba, Mahmoud. Shafika, a Palestinian child from the West Bank, is not shown in this picture.

Under the sponsorship of SAWA, Dr. House and the team visited Syria in June, 2002. The hallways of The Damascus Hospital were crowded with deaf children and hopeful parents. The team evaluated 190 children for their suitability to get a cochlear implant. Of these, not one had a hearing aid that was in all respects properly selected (prescribed), and properly fit. (These problems with hearing aids exist because in Syria, the hearing aids are sold by dealers who have no background in audiology or medicine...)

Nine children were selected– the team could only bring 9 implants in 2002– and they were given cochlear implants.

But cochlear implants do not cure deafness. If a person with glasses takes them off, they will have the same poor vision as before. Likewise, a person with a cochlear implant will be just as deaf when they take off the outside processor. Even with the processor on, cochlear implant users do not have perfect hearing. They must often be helped to get the best use out of the new hearing they have. This help is called rehabilitation.

Dr. Parnes (operating) shows Dr. Hamidi an aspect of the facial recess approach, the surgical technique invented by Dr. House and now used to do all cochlear implants worldwide.

Dr. House and his colleagues were therefore not satisfied with simply helping the precious but few children to get cochlear implants. They also wanted to have an impact on the healthcare situation in Syria more generally. For example, how could they have a beneficial impact on the prescription and fitting of hearing aids for children throughout the country? Again, providing the implants is critical, but both providing the implants and using those implants and the opportunities they provided to help the whole medical system improve would multiply the benefit many times over.

The team therefore dedicated time and energy to deepen the skills of the doctors and professionals in Syria. Working with the Ministry of Health in Syria, they assisted the program at The Damascus Hospital to improve. The head of the program, Dr. Mazan Hamadi, spent several weeks at Dr. Mourad's long-established program in Alexandria, Egypt. He then visited several programs in the United States to improve his surgical skills and increase his knowledge of the medical aspects of cochlear implants and patient rehabilitation.

When the team returned to Syria to continue working with the program at The Damascus Hospital, and to implant more children, they further trained the doctors and nurses.

Dr. Batniji and Dr. Parnes did surgery, refining the skills of Dr. Hamadi and his colleagues, while Ms. Fadda helped improve the skills of the surgical nurses. Dr. Mourad selected patients and taught the doctors more about rehabilitation.

Dr. Hamidi (standing, left) helps his residents (in green) understand the facial recess surgical approach, with the help of Dr. Batniji (standing. right). Student becomes teacher, and skills are multiplied for the benefit of many, many others.

Today, still working with SAWA and the team that Dr. House and Dr. Batniji put together, we continue to assist the professionals in Syria to deepen and extend their skills, and to provide better resources, focusing on those that can have a long-term and wide-spread beneficial impact. For example, we are assisting in providing Arabic translations of the John Tracy Clinic materials, which can be used by families to learn how to work with their child to make the best possible use of their new hearing. We have posted these translations on this website so that they may be freely used by any Arabic-speaking famililes anywhere in the world who have a child with hearing problems, regardless of whether that child has a hearing aid, a cochlear implant, or an as-yet untreated hearing loss.

Likewise, we continue to provide children with cochlear implants. Dr. House and the international team traveled to Syria in June 2003 and 17 more children were given new hearing. With your help, this work can continue, providing cochlear implants, improving healthcare generally, and, God willing, producing the world's first low-cost, high-quality cochlear implant.