The Telangana Government has decided to seek a second opinion on the possibility of separating conjoined twins Veena and Vani. It will forward the special feasibility report submitted by surgeons from Great Ormond Street Hospital, UK to specialists at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi.
The feasibility report was recently submitted to the State government, in which the UK surgeons had maintained that there was an 80 per cent chance that the twins could be successfully separated through surgery.
Since the surgery would be taken up in five stages, it would take up to a year for the whole process to be completed.
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This would entail a cost of nearly Rs.9.5 crore. Before taking a call on the proposal, the government has decided to put the onus of decision-making on the clinicians.
“We have received the doctors’ report. We will urge AIIMS experts to study the report and give their recommendations. We would like to base our decision on the advice of the clinicians,” said Principal Secretary (Health, Medical and Family Welfare) Suresh Chanda.
A decision on logistics like travel and finances to meet the surgery and stay expenses of the conjoined twins will be taken only after the AIIMS report.
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“The twins are very young and they need at least one family member to accompany them to the UK. We will take all these things into consideration after the experts at AIIMS provide an opinion,” Mr. Chanda said.
It was in February that the head of Craniofacial Unit at Great Ormond Street Hospital, Dr. David Dunaway, and the hospital’s paediatric neurosurgeon, Dr. Noor-ul-Owase Jeelani had visited Niloufer Hospital to review the condition of Veena and Vani.