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After separation, one of conjoined twins still in observation in ICU
Since Balia is the one who received the venous graft, he will take longer to recover whereas Jagga, who is the healthier of the twins, has been doing well and is also taking a semi-solid diet.
One of the conjoined twins, who were separated in a 16-hour surgery at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, is still under observation in the intensive care unit (ICU) of the hospital.
Jagannath (Jagga) and Balram (Balia), the 27-month-old craniopagus twins — joined at the head — from Odisha were separated on October 25, in India’s first craniopagus separation surgery.
Only 59 such surgeries have been done across the world, with survival rate being 10–15%.
“For the type of surgery the twins underwent, Balia is doing well. But since he is the one who received the venous graft (procedure to redirect blood flow), he will take longer to recover,” said one of his treating doctors.
Jagga, who is the healthier of the twins, has been doing well and was shifted to the normal ward on Friday. He is also taking a semi-solid diet.
Both the twins shared the same vein that drained out blood from the brain. So the doctors had to create a vein graft for one of the twins, Dr AK Mohapatra, chief of the neurosciences centre, had explained after the separation surgery.
The graft was constructed and put in place in August with the help of a Japanese surgeon, Dr Katsumi Takizawa, vascular surgeon from Asahikawa medical university.
On Saturday, Balia underwent another surgery to clean the dead and damaged tissues of the skin flap that had been placed over his head after the separation.
He also needed an allograft, which is skin graft from a donor. “There was a minor procedure to debride (removing dead skin) the older graft and put a skin graft from the skin bank. It was something we had anticipated, although in Jagga’s case, the graft is working fine,” said one of his doctors on condition of anonymity.
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