LynLee Hope who suffered from a tumor know a
'sacrococcygeal teratoma' underwent a crucial operation
at 23 weeks and then returned to her mother's womb. She
healed and continued to grow until she was born again at
36 weeks. This amazing feat was performed by a
surgeon who is nigerian but based in the U.S , Dr
Oluyinka Olutoye, and his surgeon partner , Dr. Darrell
Cass of Texas Children's Hospital
When Margaret Boemer went for a routine ultrasound 16
weeks into her pregnancy with her third child, she found
out that things were far from routine.
"They saw something on the scan, and the doctor came
in and told us that there was something seriously wrong
with our baby and that she had a sacrococcygeal
teratoma," the Plano, Texas, mom said in an interview
shared by Texas Children's Hospital. "And it was very
shocking and scary, because we didn't know what that
long word meant or what diagnosis that would bring,"
Sacrococcygeal teratoma is a tumor that develops before
birth and grows from a baby's coccyx, the tailbone.
Found more often in girls than boys, this tumor occurs in
one out of every 35,000 births.
"This is the most common tumor we see in a newborn,"
said Dr. Darrell Cass, co-director of Texas Children's
Fetal Center and associate professor of surgery,
pediatrics and obstetrics and gynecology at Baylor
College Medicine. "Even though it's the most common
we see, it's still pretty rare."
Booemer had been pregnant with twins, but lost one of
the babies before her second trimester so it was a shock
at 16 weeks to learn of her daughter's rare birth defect.
A video posted by Dr. HealthThenMore (@
healththenmore) on Oct 24, 2016 at 2:00pm PDT
"Some of these tumors can be very well-tolerated, so the
fetus has it and can get born with it and we can take it
out after the baby's born," said Cass. "But about half of
the time, they cause problems for the fetus and it's
usually causing problems because of a blood flow
problem."
Cass explained that the tumor is trying to grow by
sucking blood flow from the baby, yet the baby is also
trying to grow, too "so it becomes a competition. And in
some instances, the tumor wins and the heart just can't
keep up and the heart goes into failure and the baby
dies," he said.
With a large tumor stealing the blood supply, Boemer's
fetus was becoming more ill each day, doctors explained
to the expectant mother. Something had to be done.
Although other doctors had advised her to terminate the
pregnancy, Cass and his team told her about another
possibility: fetal surgery. This option, though, would not
be an easy road. Even worse, her baby's chances of
survival would be grim.
"LynLee didn't have much of a chance," Boemer said.
"At 23 weeks, the tumor was shutting her heart down and
causing her to go into cardiac failure, so it was a choice
of allowing the tumor to take over her body or giving her
a chance at life. It was an easy decision for us: We
wanted to give her life.
She was 23 weeks and 5 days pregnant, when Cass and
his partner surgeon, Dr. Oluyinka Olutoye, performed
the emergency fetal surgery. By this time, the tumor was
nearly larger than the fetus. They operated for about five
hours.
"The part on the fetus we do very, very quickly," said
Cass. "It's only 20 minutes or so on the actual fetus."
Most of the time is spent opening the uterus, which he
described as "a big muscle lined with membranes. We
don't want the mom's health to be jeopardized," said
Cass, who explained they work carefully, both making
the incision and sewing it up in order "to make that
uterus be as sealed and as water tight as possible."
Still, Cass said, the tumor in this case was so large a huge
incision was needed to get to it, "so it ended up that the
baby was hanging out in the air... Essentially, the fetus is
outside, like completely out, all the amniotic fluid falls
out, it's actually fairly dramatic," said Cass.
During the surgery, LynLee's heart slowed down to an
incredibly low rate.
"It basically stopped," said Cass. He credits the heart
specialist, a key member of the team, for giving the right
medication and transfusing the right amount of fluid,
allowing the surgeons to continue their work. The
surgical team removed the bulk of the tumor. When they
finished their operation, the surgeons placed LynLee
back inside the womb and sewed her mother's uterus
shut. It's kind of a miracle you're able to open the uterus
like that and seal it all back and the whole thing works,"
said Cass.
Boemer was on bed rest for the remainder of her
pregnancy. Despite her pain, she marshaled her strength
and made it another 12 weeks to nearly 36 weeks -- full
term -- when Lynlee Hope was born for the second time
via C-section on June 6. She weighed 5 pounds and 5
ounces.
After she was born, LynLee faced one more ordeal:
removing the bits of tumor that surgeons could not reach,
which had begun to grow again.
"At eight days old, she had more surgery, and they were
able to remove the rest of the tumor," explained Boemer.
LynLee recovered in the NICU and weeks later, arrived
in her family home. Baby Boemer is still an infant but is
doing beautiful," said Cass, remarking that she is
perfectly healthy. His one previous surgery of this kind
was also a success. "I think she's about 7 now, and she
sings karaoke to Taylor swift -- she's completely
normal," said Cass.
Source: CNN

FTC.. Lol