Surgeon repairs arm of Albanian 12-year-old

The healing process will begin for an Albanian girl whose nonimmigrant visa to receive medical treatment in the U.S. was initially denied.

Marita Ulaj, 12, is now in Spokane and had surgery on her crippled arm Wednesday at the Shriners hospital in Spokane.

“Her surgery lasted a little over two hours,” said Marvel Nichols, the Spokane woman who met Ulaj in the Albanian mountain villages near Shkoder where she teaches gymnastics in the summer.

Sally Mildren, public relations specialist for Shriners Hospital, said Dr. Paul Caskey, pediatric orthopedic surgeon and chief of staff, performed the surgery. He said in an e-mail that the surgery went well and Ulaj is stable and doing fine.

“They cut a piece of bone out and realigned the bones in her elbow,” Nichols said.

When Ulaj was about 6, she fell off a rock wall in her village of Boga and broke her arm. The bone was set improperly and atrophied at a frozen right angle to her body.

Nichols said the doctors called the procedure an osteotomy.

“She’s a trouper,” Nichols said of Ulaj.

Ulaj’s Albanian translator, Genta Hysaj, said the young girl reported being in a little pain, but was smiling.

“The nurses gave her very good help,” Hysaj said.

Ulaj also has hearing loss, which Spokane Valley Ear, Nose & Throat will be treating.

“They asked if I would assist with her, and I said certainly,” said Dr. Charles Benage, an otolaryngologist at the clinic.

Benage said although he hasn’t evaluated Ulaj yet, his impression of her condition is that it may be a minor problem that could become serious if left untreated.

Nichols’ 10 months of making arrangements for free medical treatment and raising money for expenses was almost in vain when Ulaj and her 23-year-old translator were denied their visas just a month before the surgery.

U.S. Embassy officials said they didn’t have enough evidence to show the pair would return to Albania after the treatments.

For most of July they had to gather extra paperwork and documents, including statements from doctors along with information on property values and taxes to convince the embassy they were going to return to their country.

The two got their visas after trying a second time. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers’ staff and Sen. Maria Cantwell tried to expedite the process.

Ulaj and her translator are staying with Nichols in her home on Pacific Avenue.

Hysaj said life here is much different than in Albania.

Back home, Hysaj works six days a week as a translator, from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., and occasionally goes dancing on the weekend.

Ulaj’s daily routine requires her to clean house, then tend goats the rest of the day out in the hills. Her family has no running water, so she also has to fill buckets.

Realizing that after treatments began there wouldn’t be much time for fun excursions, Nichols took the visitors to Silverwood Theme Park in Idaho.

Hysaj said Ulaj had never seen a water park or owned a bathing suit.

“Beautiful,” said the shy Ulaj to her interpreter.

For the next 16 weeks of recovery, Nichols said, she will do her best to keep Ulaj comfortable and keep her diet as close as possible to what she eats in Albania — mainly fresh vegetables, meat, cheese and bread.

“She had a sandwich the other day. She never had a sandwich before,” Nichols said.