Lakshmi is halfway home, say Bangalore docs

Bangalore: The journey from a remote village near the Bihar-Nepal border to IT city Bangalore may have been long and arduous, but Lakshmi's journey to recovery has just about begun.

The surgery to separate Lakshmi from her parasitic twin which started at 0830 hrs (IST) on Tuesday will go on well into Wednesday.

“We have been successful in making the separation at both the bony and the spinal level between the parasitic twin and Lakshmi,” said Neurosurgeon, Sparsh Hospital, Dr Thimappa Hegde.

A 40-hour long complicated operation will involve the paediatric team spending up to eight hours separating the parasitic twin's tissue from Lakshmi. The team will attempt to transplant the parasitic twin's healthy kidney into Lakshmi.

Lakshmi's genital system and bladder need to be moved from the left side of her body to a more centred position.

The neurosurgical team will then come in to separate Lakshmi's spine from her twin, which will take six to eight hours. The orthopaedic surgeon must then close Lakshmi's pelvic bones, which are widely separated.

Finally, the plastic surgery team will come back to close all of Lakshmi's wounds. Further operations may be required to correct Lakshmi's clubfeet.

Meanwhile Laxmi's parents have been getting hourly updates and are hopeful that at the end, their daughter will be able to lead a normal life.

“As a father I am worried, but also hopeful that everything will be fine,” says Lakshmi’s father, Shambhu.

It happens in one out of 50,000 cases, of conjoined twins that's how rare Lakshmi is and as the country prays for the two-year-old, if this complicated and risky surgery is indeed successful, it will not only a fist in the country but will be a landmark in the surgery of Ischiophagus conjoined twins in India.

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