1-month-old operated on to remove twin from his tummy

1-month-old operated on to remove twin from his tummy

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Mumbai:3.8.2021

City doctors have successfully operated on a baby boy who was born with his own ‘twin’ inside his abdomen — a rare condition called ‘fetus-in-fetu’. It is estimated to occur in one of 5 lakh live births.

Doctors suspected something unusual when they picked up, what they thought to be a cyst, in the baby’s abdomen during a routine ultrasound of the mother in the fifth month of pregnancy. Two months later, when the mother presented for a follow-up scan in the seventh month of pregnancy, it was clear that the mass was not a cyst. The scan found bones and viscera, suggestive of the body parts of the foetus that was inside the abdomen of the healthy foetus.

The couple in their thirties, who did not wish to be identified, said they were advised to carry on with the pregnancy by the doctors at the suburban maternity hospital they were consulting. “We were anxious, but the doctors told us that any intervention has to be done only after the baby is born,” the father told TOI.

He said that the pregnancy was continued to term, and the baby was born without any complications. The couple consulted multiple doctors who recommended removal of the ‘dead twin’.

They approached the Narayana Health’s SRCC Children’s Hospital after the baby was a month old. Doctors found the dead twin inside an amniotic sac located in the upper part of the newborn’s tummy, displacing vital structures.

“Incidence of fetus-in-fetu is extremely rare. Due to lack of adequate blood supply and nourishment one fetus doesn’t survive. A challenge in such cases is to remove the baby with the amniotic sac intact,” said Dr Sarita Bhagwat, senior paediatric surgeon who led the operation. “The dead foetus had underdeveloped vertebrae, femur and humerus (bone in upper arm) and two limb bones, which we could remove completely,” said the surgeon. The healthy baby was recently discharged from the hospital.