PALO ALTO, Calif., Nov. 1 (UPI) -- Surgeons at Stanford University in California have successfully separated conjoined 2-year-old girls, fused at their shared livers, hospital officials said.
A team of 20 doctors and nurses participated in the procedure at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital to separate Angelica and Angelina Sabuco Tuesday, hospital spokeswoman Reena Mukamal told the San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News.
After the separation procedure the sisters were moved into separate operating rooms for some reconstructive surgeries.
Without the surgery, doctors said, the twins, from San Jose, would have faced a life of curved spine and muscle problems.
The rare procedure did pose the threat of massive bleeding or the catastrophic introduction of an air bubble into the venous system, causing heart attack or stroke, they said.
The twins are expected to spend four or five days in intensive care before being removed to a regular hospital room for a week or so before returning home to San Jose.
"I have mixed emotions. I am nervous, but excited," the girls' mother, Ginady Sabuco, had said before the surgery. "But I want them to live normally, like other children ... and someday go to school and finish their studies and have a good future."
