"He has developed some fear, some psychological or mental problem," weeps Zahoor Ahmed, sitting on a bench beside his son's bed at Islamabad's main hospital, the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS).

The boy suffered serious head injuries and a fractured shoulder when his school in the devastated Pakistani Kashmir city of Muzaffarabad -- like thousands of others across the country -- collapsed in Saturday's quake.

The family's house also collapsed and Ahmed's wife lost both of her legs.

"All he does is shout 'go, get out, there is an earthquake'," added Ahmed, 35, a power company worker.

Yet, the boy was one of the lucky ones.

Only a select few hundred were aboard the first helicopters out of the disaster zone. They then got the medical aid that tens of thousands of others have little chance of ever receiving.

PIMS's paediatric wards are crowded with young quake victims ranging in age from 18 months to 12 years. They came from the hardest hit areas -- Muzaffarabad, Balakot, Bagh, Rawalakot.

"Some 190 children have so far been brought and admitted to four wards," Zaheer Abbasi, the hospital's head of paediatric surgery, told AFP.

He said they all bear the gruesome signature of the earthquake: crush injuries to the head, abdomen, chest and head, broken limbs, and worse.

"We had to amputate the limbs of five children, aged from six to 12. They had either hand or leg injuries and they were very serious," he said.

Four-year-old Junaid, a grimy toy mobile phone clutched in his hand, lay on a bed with severe leg injuries. His cousin Bilal, who is a year older, was on an adjacent bed with his fractured legs in casts.

Sleeping 30-month-old Muzammil, from the Kashmiri town of Bagh, had his legs bandaged up to his groin.

"Our house was demolished by the quake. He was crying 'Mama, Mama'. I broke a window and dragged him out," said his father Mohammad Maroof, 31. "My niece, cousin and a sister-in-law died."

Other people who escaped from Bagh said at least three schools in the town collapsed, trapping many children inside. "The kids were mostly nursery and kindergarten students," said Naeem Akhtar, a teacher who came to see the wounded students from Bagh.

The doctors say many more children will be brought to PIMS in coming days as rescuers reach the most remote areas, which have been completely cut off by landslides and remain inaccessible except by helicopter.

Some will have to deal not only with their injuries but also the fact that they are orphans.

"Unfortunately some of the wounded... lost both of their parents. They do not know whom they should call," said doctor Hashim Reza, choking on his words after another long day tending to the wounded.

"They are being looked after by volunteers who are treating them like their children."

All rights reserved. © 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.