Doctors Perform First-Ever Brain Surgery on Unborn Baby
Baby Denver is a living miracle after she was diagnosed with a rare and often deadly brain disorder inside her mother’s womb.
The daughter of Derek and Kenyatta Coleman, of Louisiana, Denver made history in March as the first unborn baby to successfully undergo brain surgery, according to the Irish news outlet Gript.
Months later, the Colemans said Denver is meeting all the normal baby milestones and enjoying life at home with her three older siblings. She is doing “fantastically well,” her mother said.
“We want to allow the opportunity for other parents to turn to the same procedure in hopes of saving their children,” Kenyatta Coleman told the NBC Today Show in a recent interview.
At 30 weeks of pregnancy, Denver was diagnosed with a rare and sometimes fatal brain abnormality called vein of Galen malformation. The blood vessel condition can cause high blood pressure and lead to heart failure and other potentially fatal problems, according to a press release from the American Heart Association. The condition affects about one in 60,000 unborn babies.
The news devastated the Colemans, but they soon found a spark of hope through an experimental fetal surgery being offered at Boston Children’s Hospital in Massachusetts.
Derek Coleman said they gave an “immediate yes” to the trial surgery because they wanted to do whatever they could to save Denver’s life.
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“We are deeply rooted in our faith and we had been praying about this thing the whole time,” he said.
Kenyatta added: “Going in, we knew what the prognosis could have been, so for us there was no other way. We found out that this opportunity was available, and Derek and I mutually agreed that we knew from the very beginning if there was a possibility to save her life … that we go for it.”
On March 15, Kenyatta and Denver underwent the experimental surgery. Doctors and researchers later wrote about the successful procedure in an article published in Stroke, a journal of the American Heart Association.
Here’s more from the report:
The breakthrough surgery was carried out in Boston, with doctors using an ultrasound to help guide a needle into the mother’s abdomen, up through the uterus wall, and into the baby’s brain. …
Authors detailed how the procedure was successful, with “immediate marked flow reduction” seen on the ultrasound intraprocedural – and a 43% fall in total cardiac output after echocardiography.
The authors detailed how baby Denver was delivered by induction [on March 17] at 34 weeks, and at three-weeks old, had required no cardiovascular support and no postnatal embolization – with the baby’s neurological exam being normal.
Kenyatta told the Today show that God answered her prayers and brought her and her baby girl through the surgery safely.
“The most beautiful moment [was] being able to hold her, gaze up on her and then hear her cry,” she said.
Months have passed since then, and the Colemans said Denver continues to thrive. By telling her story, they to encourage other families whose unborn babies receive the same diagnosis.
“She’s doing amazing. She’s showing improvements,” her mother said.
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