A team of 16 surgeons and nurses successfully concluded 25 hours of delicate surgery yesterday to separate twin Bangladeshi girls who had been joined at their heads, sharing blood vessels and brain tissue.
It is too early to know whether the two-year-old girls, Trishna and Krishna, suffered any brain damage during the marathon operation — an outcome doctors said had a 50-50 chance.
The girls will remain in an induced coma for monitoring for several days after the completion of the surgery.
PHOTO: AFP
The medical team began the work on Monday morning on separating the girls, who were brought to Australia as infants by an aid organization.
“The teams managed to separate their brains and they are both very well,” Royal Children’s Hospital chief Leo Donnan told reporters.
“Now we have the long task of the reconstructive surgery, which will go on for many hours,” he said.
Plastic surgeons finished reconstructing the girls’ skulls using a combination of their own skin, bone grafts and artificial materials about five hours after the separation surgery ended.
“Their bodies have to recover from this and we’ve got a lot of unknown territory we’re moving into,” Donnan said. “All I can say is that everything is in place for the best possible outcome. The main thing is that the girls are healthy.”
Earlier yesterday, Ian McKenzie, a member of the surgical team, said the girls were improving as their bodies began to work individually.
“The twins are actually in better condition because the degree of separation has increased and this problem we’ve had with their circulation affecting each other has actually gotten less,” he said.
The girls shared parts of their skull, brain tissue and blood flow.
Before the surgery, doctors had said there was a 50 percent chance the girls could suffer brain damage and a 25 percent chance one of the sisters would die.
They were found in an orphanage in Bangladesh in 2007 by a representative from the Children First Foundation, who brought to them to Australia.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the