Rare surgery saves baby from monster tumour

Jhansi: A private nursing home in Jhansi has performed an incredibly rare surgery to save a month-old baby from a life-threatening condition.
Daughter of a couple from Sagar, the infant girl was brought to the heal hub run by paediatric surgeon Dr Arun Gupta with an abnormally swollen stomach on Wednesday. She was constantly crying and clearly in pain.
Quick diagnosis, Dr Gupta told TOI, revealed that a massive 10cm tissue mass was squeezing her internal organs, including kidney and intestines, and causing her huge discomfort. “The tumour was shaped like a foetus, a condition medically known as foetus-in-foetu. The condition is very rare. The estimated occurrence is one in every 5-10 lakh births,” the doctor said.
A team of just two doctors, including the paediatric surgeon, and a handful of support staff pulled off the difficult three-hour surgery on Thursday.
“The tumour had a well-formed head with tiny strands of hair. Facial features were discernible. The specimen has been sent for histopathological analysis or in other words, microscopic examination of abnormal tissue,” Dr Kumar said, adding that the baby was recovering slowly and steadily.
There have been only a handful of foetus-in-foetu cases worldwide, one of the first being detected in 1808. There are two theories of origin of this condition. One says that the mass begins as a normal foetus, but becomes enveloped inside its twin. The other theory is that the mass is a highly developed teratoma, which is in layman language a tumour made up of several different types of tissue such as hair, muscles and bones.