Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) successfully performed a surgery that saw separation of four-month-old conjoined twins.
Speaking after the 15-hour long procedure, on Monday, February 6, KNH Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Doctor Evans Kamuri led his team of 38 medical personnel in sharing their journey to success.
He noted that it took the effort of every specialist in the team to save the lives of the two boys.
“We have successfully managed to separate conjoined twins who were brought in from Bungoma County and I am proud to say I had a team of 38 medical personnel and 25 of those were consultant surgeons,” he stated.
Pediatric surgeon, Dr Joel Lessan, explained how the procedure was delicate since they had to deal with the two children independently because they had both suffered from heart complications.
“These were two kids, two boys and were joined at the chest and at the abdomen where they shared one liver and in the chest, each had a heart that was enclosed in one chamber
"One of the twins had multiple holes in the heart and the other one had abnormal blood vessels, large bloomer blood vessels emerging from the heart. It made us deal with two children who had suffered abnormalities in the heart independently,” he narrated.
Kamuri noted that they looked forward to working with other facilities in conducting such complicated procedures and appreciated the team for the great work they performed.
“We are proud of the team and again as a hospital, we will continue supporting other facilities so that we can have this type of specialised surgery. Even in our annexes, we want to extend so that we can be doing such services even in other counties,” he uttered.
The facility had also successfully separated conjoined twins in 2017.
The two girls were born in September 2014 and were successfully separated after they got transferred, on September 2017, to the surgical clinic and arrived in the company of their mother.
On November 30, 2021, another set of conjoined twin girls was born in a private facility before being transferred to the Kisii Teaching and Referral Hospital. They were also joined at the chest and abdomen area.
