PHILADELPHIA, Nov. 8 (UPI) -- Doctors in Philadelphia have successfully separated conjoined twins who shared a chest wall, diaphragm and liver at birth, hospital officials said.
The 8-month-old girls -- Allison June and Amelia Lee Tucker -- had been monitored since doctors at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia first discovered the rare birth anomaly during the 20th week of their mother Shellie Tucker's pregnancy. The girls had yet to leave hospital since birth, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Wednesday.
A team of 40 doctors and nurses led by Dr. Holly L. Hedrick, a pediatric general, thoracic and fetal surgeon, worked for 7 hours to separate the sisters.
"Like all separations of conjoined twins, this was a very complex surgery, but it went very well and as expected," Hedrick said in a press release.
Instances of conjoined twins are very rare, occurring in 1 in every 200,000 live births, CBS News reported. It happens when a single egg is fertilized twice, but doesn't fully separate into two fetuses.
The survival rate for conjoined twins is between 5 percent and 25 percent, doctors said.
