Bandages off for eye op boy

Staff held their breath when Sacha's bandages came off

An 11-year-old boy from Belarus is back home with his carers in Norfolk after pioneering eye surgery.

It is thought Sacha Gruzd's condition was linked to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.

Sacha underwent the surgery at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, Norwich, on Saturday, where staff gave up their own time to do the operation.

A spokesman for the hospital said Sacha had been born without the muscle to raise his eyelids.

To see he had to tip his head far back to see through a slit of his eyelids.

Without corrective surgery the boy would have developed serious problems with his back and arthritis in his neck in the next few years.

To correct the rare condition muscles were taken from the boy's leg and grafted into his eyelids.

Sacha Gruzd is recovering following the operation

Consultant surgeon Began Beigi, who led the team, said when the bandages came off on Sunday everyone held their breath:

"We had a short period of anxious time because we removed his dressing and fusing stitches and for a period of two minutes nothing was happening.

"He couldn't do anything with the eyes, but it fortunately it was a false alarm. Everything worked fine for this stage of the operation."

Sacha was brought to the UK by the charity Chernobyl Children Lifeline.

It will be another two weeks before he can return to Bellarus.