"To have free surgery in Beijing is the best gift I have ever received," said Aklim, who arrived in the capital city on Tuesday evening after a 33-hour train journey from Urumqi, Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

A doctor at the People's Liberation Army Air Force General Hospital in Beijing checks the health of 2-year-old Alinur Alimjan on Wednesday. Alinur, a Uygur girl from Shufu county, the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, was diagnosed with congenital heart disease when she was 4 months old.

Aklim, who didn't provide her full name, is now 11 and was diagnosed with congenital heart disease seven years ago. She has been out of school since September, about the time her health took a turn for the worse.

"Her mother and I were so worried," said Aklim's father, Rdlet. "But we were not able to afford surgery."

To obtain better treatment for his daughter, Rdlet, who originally worked as a miner, decided in 2010 to move his family from Manas county, in the northern part of Xinjiang, to Urumqi.

A local hospital wanted to charge 50,000 yuan (US$7,600) for the heart operation. Her parents, who earn less than 2,000 yuan a month, couldn't afford to pay so much.

But their life changed on Feb 8, when Rdlet glanced at a local newspaper.

There he read that the China Charity Federation had been running a health project called Xinlei, which will pay for 51 children suffering from heart disease to receive free medical treatment in Beijing.

Even better news came when the Xinjiang branch of the All-China Women's Federation, co-organizer of the project, approved Rdlet's application for his daughter's surgery only three days after he had signed up the program.

"I don't know how to express my gratitude to everyone who help us with this surgery," said Rdlet, the 37-year-old Kazakh father. "It will be a big relief for our family if my daughter gets well."

It will take about a month for the 51 children from poor families in Xinjiang to undergo medical operations at the Beijing-based Air Force General Hospital, said Xu Aisu, publicity director with the hospital.

The China Charity Federation will pay 15,000 yuan for each child. In cases in which the medical expenses exceed the original budget, the hospital will cover the remaining part of the bills.

The young patients can claim a variety of ethnicities as their own, including Uygur, Kazakh, Hui and Han. In consideration of that, the hospital has prepared Muslim cuisine, according to Xu.

The children will undergo comprehensive physical examinations on Wednesday and Thursday. And if preparatory work goes smoothly, the hospital plans to arrange operations for two children on Friday, said Yang Junmin, a chief cardiovascular doctor in the hospital.

The Air Force General Hospital initiated the medical treatment program with the China Charity Federation in 2009.

So far, 56 children, hailing from provinces and autonomous regions that include Tibet, Qinghai and Sichuan, have received the assistance and recovered.