Conjoined twins to get separated by Hungarian doctors

Rabia and Rukiya are normal two-year-old girls except one thing. They are conjoined by their heads. Their parents wanted to separate them, but no doctors in the world have ever attempted to perform such a risky operation. Yet, as blikk.hu reports, a Hungarian team of three were brave enough to do so.

Dr András Csókay told Blikk that the little ones’ skulls had were healed and the palliums clumped together. Furthermore, they also shared the main vein network in their brains.

As he was reading the MR results, it came to his mind that they could look at the case as if it was a big brain tumor. That means that they would close the veins to make the blood flow another way. This is what they actually did with a catheter method.

The doctors

Dr András Csókay and Gergely Pataki, plastic surgeon, travelled together to Bangladesh last year and this was when they met the two girls. Dr Csókay was sure about dr István Hudák’s expertise. It was because they both worked at the Honvédkórház (Hungarian Homeland Defence Hospital). Moreover, dr Hudák is acknowledged in many different countries from where he is usually called to solve difficult cases.

The two of them had been preparing for the surgery for three months.

Preparation and the surgery

The doctors were examining the twins’ veins with arteriography (using paint to follow the blood flow) for three hours. After that came the five hours long surgery. According to dr. Hudák, precision was the key because they did not want any of the children to die.

There was a 20 percent chance to come to grief, but the good news is that the surgery was successful.

The girls woke up healthy and smiling. From the outside, one could notice no difference even though the biggest step of the separation had been finished. Now, the girls’ brains work separately.

Plans for the future

Gergely Pataki is going to place a special tissue expander into the girls’ brains in April. After that,

the doctors can separate the heads in September.

This time, they will need to replace parts of the skulls that will be missing. Until then, dr Csókay said he will be practising in the dissecting room.

Featured image: Illustration, www.facebook.com/melissamoonontv

Source: blikk.hu