Hospital authorities at the King Khalid University Hospital on Tuesday restricted visits to Ibrahim, the bed-ridden patient who is undergoing treatment for quadriplegia following a traffic accident in 2012.

Ibrahim, using micro-blogging website Twitter, tweeted a message on Sunday from his id Ibrahim @glaad2007 expressing his loneliness after his family members stopped visiting him, with the exception of his sister. The tweet drew an overwhelming response from the public with crowds of well wishers arriving at the hospital in droves to offer moral support.

A hashtag was generated in response to his tweets, which was used more than 200,000 times, making it the most re-tweeted post in a single day.

Ibrahim could not have imagined what happened next. Within a few hours, there was a queue of people outside his room as his twitter plea had led to an outpouring of sympathy from Saudi netizens, all waiting to meet him.

The large turnout prompted hospital authorities to put a curb on the visits on Tuesday. Even the media was restricted from meeting the patient as was witnessed by Arab News.

In a new development, hospital staff said that the 28-year-old Ibrahim is not a Saudi as was largely thought but an Afghan national born in Saudi Arabia and his full name is Ibrahim Deen Mohammed. Ibrahim said that he met with a road accident while driving a car in 2012, which resulted in quadriplegia.

He was hospitalized eight months ago for treatment and rehabilitation. His father, an octogenarian cannot visit him.

Sharing his idea about the tweet, Ibrahim said that his sister who visits him has a twitter account and that she had sent the message about his loneliness.

Ibrahim also thanked people for visiting and the support extended to him.

Earlier, he told reporters that before the accident he was working with a salary of SR1,700 and that his sponsor was continuing to pay his monthly salary.

“May the Almighty reward him for all his kindness,” he said.

He said that as far as the donations for his treatment in Germany or the Czech Republic went, he had not received any monetary assistance besides the bouquets of flowers or some gifts in kind. However, he said that he needed money for his treatment and expressed hopes that people would come forward to help him out.