Australian and Indian doctors separate conjoined twins after 12-hr surgery

Agencies

21 June 2012:  The team of 23 doctors operated on the 11-month-old twins at a missionary hospital in Madhya Pradesh state’s Betul district on Wednesday.

 

The twins Stuti and Aradhana (both meaning Prayer in Hindi), who were joined at the chest and abdomen, were moved to an intensive care unit after the surgery, broadcaster NDTV reported quoting doctors.

 

The doctors said they will wait at least two to three days before declaring the separation successful, the news channel reported.

A doctor, Rajeev Chaudhari, said it was "complicated surgery" that involved separating the girls’ livers which were fused together, as well as their hearts that were covered inside a common membrane.

The operation in Betul, some 200 kilometres south of state capital Bhopal, was made possible by donations from private individuals and the state government.

 

The twins were born to a poor farmer last July, who abandoned them at the hospital expressing his inability to take care of them and bear the expenses of surgery.

 

Since then, the girls have been looked after by the hospital staff. But because of the surgery the parents are now eager to take them home again.