Ease Pathani’s Suffering Through Mesh Hernioplasty

Pathani Dilbar Ali's Story

For three years, Pathani Dilbar Ali, a 48-year-old woman from Doulat Por, Shaheed Benazirabad, has lived with a painful lump in her lower abdomen. The lump has been growing and becoming more painful over time. The pain has become part of her daily life. She visited a nearby doctor, who advised laboratory tests and an ultrasound scan. She was diagnosed with an incisional hernia, a bulge that forms when tissue pushes through a weak spot in the abdominal wall at the site of an old surgical wound. She had gynecological surgery about four years ago, and that old wound is where the hernia has formed. The doctor has recommended mesh hernioplasty, an operation that repairs the hernia and strengthens the wall with a mesh so the tissue is held in place. However, Pathani’s family is facing financial hardships and cannot afford it. Left untreated, the painful lump will keep growing, and her pain will continue. The discomfort she has already carried for three years will not ease on its own.

Pathani is a widow. After her husband died, she went to live with her brother. She has no children of her own. Her brother is a daily wage laborer and the sole breadwinner for a household of ten, including his wife, their seven children, and Pathani. He earns about PKR 18,000 a month. The family lives together in a small hut in a rural area, on a two-marla plot with a single room. That modest wage covers food and daily needs for ten people sharing one room. There is no spare money left for surgery.

In a quiet voice, Pathani asked for help: “There are days when I cannot stand properly due to this pain. I already live under someone else’s roof and feel helpless. I want to sit, walk, and sleep without holding my side. Kindly help me find relief from this pain.”

Pathani has borne her illness quietly while depending on her brother’s kindness. She asks only for the mesh hernioplasty that can ease the pain she has lived with for so long.

Come forward and help Pathani undergo this surgery so she can recover with dignity, and so the years of pain can finally end.