Posted on 03/27/2006 10:33:54 PM PST by beaversmom
CAIRO (Reuters) - An Egyptian girl who had an operation more than a year ago to remove the head of her underdeveloped twin has died following an infection in her brain, her doctor said on Sunday.
Egyptian doctors operated on Manar Maged in February 2005, when she was 10 months old, to remove the second head which was capable of smiling and blinking but not independent life.
"She was admitted to hospital in a very bad way ... She died at 3 a.m. (0100 GMT) on Saturday," said Abla el-Alfy, a consultant in paediatric intensive care.
"She had a very severe infection in the brain and she wasn't able to fight it," added Alfy, who was part of the team that operated on Manar last year in a hospital north of Cairo.
Manar's condition, known as craniopagus parasiticus, is one of the rarest forms of birth defects and occurs when an embryo begins to split into twins but does not complete the process. One of the conjoined twins then fails to fully develop.
Doctors had said surviving the complicated 13-hour operation was a big achievement.
Manar's condition improved in the months after the operation to remove her underdeveloped twin but Alfy said she had suffered from repeated infections since then.
I saw a documentary about her not long ago. Very strange....sorry to hear she died.
Yikes - how do you unsee that?
That poor girl... I was really hoping she'd be ok. :(
Bad joke, but I can't resist. I always thought two heads were better than one. Please forgive me, but its late at night and my better has long since gone to sleep.
I never read about this. OMG those poor souls. I'm sure they are dancing and smiling together now. God bless them and their mother.
Babies like Manar Maged become extremely potent angels. May God comfort her mother and father.
I don't mean to be insensitive (I hope I'm not). I really feel bad that she's dead. My prayers are with her family. It's a tragedy it happened.
But I seriously think I'm going to throw up.
It's definitely different but the sleeping baby that wasn't full formed had an angelic little face.
Your joke is sick. But if I may, was she her brother's keeper? Did she have a good head on her shoulders?
poor little loves.. they are with Jesus now..
I'm not trying to start an argument. I must ask however; from where do you know that "Babies like Manar Maged become extremely potent angels." If Scripture, please quote chapter and verse(s).
Thank you.
Frwy
Thanks for that post - wonder where people got the modern notion that humans become angels after death? It's sure firmly entrenched.
Sorry the child died, but sometimes it's the best thing rather than a life of misery. I saw the TV documentary on this awhile back.
It sure is. I hear it all the time. The part that worries me is if that idea is so firmly held, what other error is also dangerously believed. It makes the difference between life and death. With that in the balance, what else matters!
God bless
Is it possible that the amputation was performed only for the purpose of aesthetics? Could both of the conjoined have lived even though limited physically compared to standard humans? Though, were there capabilities in the category of psychology that could have been learned from by the processes between the two conjoined?
It is ignorant and selfish to say that the development was a definite suffering, and the proof is their smiles they made...
Perhaps the two conjoined humans would have enlightenment within the mental and spiritual realm that could have superseded the aesthetically approved humans, if they so chose to be.
Frank,
I watched a documentary on Tru TV last night about this. Watched the surgery done and everything. The mothers OBGYN said that when the lady got the ultrasound that the ultrasound techs only look for specific things so they didn’t even notice it. All they saw were Marna and then her normal twin sister. They totally missed the extra head on Marna. You would think though, that even thought ultrasound techs are only looking for certain things you wouldn’t miss something like this. Maybe then something could of been done before the babies were born but maybe not. On the documentary they showed the girl and she wasn’t right after the surgery. She had severe brain damage and couldn’t move or anything. Before the surgery she was a very happy baby always smiling, but after the surgery she just laid there and cried quite a bit. I feel very sorry for the little girl but I have to say that she is definitely in a better place now.
Her heart couldn’t sustain both bodies; they were both going to die if they didn’t operate to remove the “parasite.”
The mother said that her little girl used to smile all the time, but after the operation she never smiled at all.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.