Pak doctor leads campaign to provide aid to needy patients

If one man can make the difference, as the adage goes, Dr. Khaleelur Rahman is surely one of those men who are out to bring succor to the lives of people in need of assistance — educational, social or even medical.
At least 31,000 deprived patients mainly belonging to the expatriate community in the Kingdom have benefited from 200 free medical camps that Rahman has been organizing every fortnight since 2006.
Talking to Arab News Rahman said the voluntary camps, being held under the auspices of the Pakistan Consulate General, Jeddah, are being organized throughout the Kingdom beginning with Jeddah, Taif, Makkah and Madinah.
A kidney specialist with King Faisal Hospital, Rahman is engaged in establishing a major kidney hospital in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The aim, he said, is to reach out to hundreds of thousands of people in the northern part of the country who are unable to get treatment for several diseases mainly related to nephrology.
This is apart from conducting a series of value-adding health seminars and employment and educational workshops.
Renowned expatriates and philanthropists support the operations of Pakistan Welfare Society (PWS) that is providing medical diagnosis, laboratory tests and medicines to the needy regardless of age, gender or nationality by holding free medical camps.
Rahman’s efforts to aid people in medical need has its background dating to 2005 when an earthquake in Pakistan killed 100,000 people and left far more homeless. The quake had its epicenter in Pakistan but the impact was felt as far as Saudi Arabia. Many Pakistani expats rose to the occasion to help their compatriots.
Rahman, who visited Abbottabad in one such voluntary service trip, was moved to see the plight of the people and decided to do his best in his own way to help people. Out came his idea to form the PWS which swung into action beginning a series of camps in the Kingdom and initiating the establishment of a grand Pakistan Kidney Center (PKC) in Abbottabad specializing in kidney diseases for which there is no facility in northern Pakistan.
“The hospital, which is nearing completion as many philanthropists began supporting the project, will have free treatment,” Rahman said.
PKC was launched in December 2012 by Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb.
The 11,184–square-foot land on the main Karakoram Highway, 5 km south of Abbottabad, has been donated by one of the trustees. The estimated project cost of 126 million Pakistani rupees (SR4.8 million) is being raised through private donations from all over the world.
The hospital will be ready for inauguration in March, Rahman said. An estimated 10 million patients will benefit from state-of-the-art kidney dialysis technology, latest medical facilities, and highly trained doctors and kidney specialists.
In the recently held annual dinner function on the project, which was attended by Pakistan Consul General Aftab Ahmed Khokhar among other prominent citizens, PWS President Rahman presented through slides and videos on the project the construction status of the center.




Supervised by a board of trustees, PKC is being managed with full devotion and transparency, he said.