COLUMBUS – For the fourth time since 1978, surgeons at Nationwide Children’s Hospital has successfully separated conjoined twins.
The team of more than 30 specialists separated 11-month-old conjoined twins during a 16-hour operations Thursday, hospital officials announced Monday.
Acen and Apio Akello, the daughters of Ester Akello of Uganda, were flown to Nationwide Children’s in December.
Two neurosurgeons focused on one sister each and yet assisted each other to delicately divide their intertwined spinal cords. The girls were labeled “blue” and “red” to help surgeons know which monitoring equipment belonged to each sister as they carefully separated their spines, muscle and tissue.
“Because of the delicate job our neurosurgeons had of separating the spinal cord, our team was assisted by neurophysiologic intraoperative monitoring and the technicians were able to tell us which muscles and nerves belonged to Acen and which belonged to Apio. This is the first time this specific type of monitoring has been done in a conjoined twins’ separation surgery,” said Dr. Gail Besner, chief of Pediatric Surgery.
“In the operating room we were able to visualize and discern which nerves belonged to which twin,” Dr. Jeffrey R. Leonard, chief of neurosurgery, said. “Our primary concern was preservation of the twins’ neurologic function so they may have adequate leg movement and bowel and bladder function once separated.”
The surgery began at 7:30 a.m. and concluded at 11:30 p.m. The surgical team consisted of specialists from pediatric surgery, plastic surgery, colorectal surgery, neurosurgery, anesthesiology and nursing.
Conjoined twins occur in about 1 in 200,000 pregnancies.
It is not yet known how long Acen and Apio will remain at the hospital before going home.