lets pray to SAI ....

[Guest guest]

As fellow souls...keep aside a moment....lets send a kind prayeful

thought to the

twins wishing them success...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SINGAPORE, July 8 (Reuters) - Neurosurgeons trying to separate

Iranian twins joined at the head teased apart tightly packed brain

tissue and blood vessels on Tuesday as the life-threatening

operation moved into its third day.

 

Soothing classical music played in the operating theatre as the team

of 28 doctors and about 100 assistants at a Singapore hospital

battled unstable blood circulation amid an array of lines that feed

Laleh and Ladan Bijani intravenously and monitored their vital

signs.

 

After cutting open the 29-year-old pair's joint skull in the hours

after the surgery began on Sunday, five neurosurgeons were prying

apart the brains millimetre by millimetre, said Dr Prem Kumar Nair,

a spokesman for Singapore's Raffles Hospital.

 

"In the process of separating, you cannot just tear them apart. They

have to be teased apart very slowly, cut, teased apart, cut, teased

apart," he told reporters.

 

"Although the brains are distinctly separate, because they have been

fused for the last 29 years they are very adherent to each other."

 

Another official said this part of the surgery had taken much longer

than the expected 10 hours.

 

"Part of the brain has been dissected, but they haven't reached the

base yet," the official said.

 

"It has been 16 hours since they started this part of the operation

and the separation has taken much longer than expected."

 

German doctors turned away the twins in 1996, saying splitting them

could prove fatal. But the Bijanis were determined to lead separate

lives and persuaded Singapore doctors to operate despite the risks.

 

CIRCULATION PROBLEM

 

Nair said doctors had completed a key part of the operation, using a

leg vein extracted from Ladan's right thigh to replace for her a

shared major vein that drained blood from the brains.

 

But after the bypass, blood circulation between the twins became

unstable.

 

As well as music to soothe them in their work, the doctors have been

taking food and massage breaks through the night.

 

The operation has drawn worldwide attention as the twins' elderly

parents await the outcome in Iran. Supporters in Singapore are

holding a prayer vigil at the hospital.

 

On Monday, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami pledged to cover the

cost of the surgery, estimated at around $300,000.

 

Asked if the vein bypass was the riskiest part of the surgery, Nair

said other hurdles lay ahead.

 

The first stage of the operation, opening the two skulls, also took

longer than expected because the bone where the twins are joined was

thick and compact.

 

"The process that is now being undertaken by the neurosurgeons is

equally difficult," Nair said.

 

Twins joined at the head occur only once in every two million live

births. Successful separation is very rare. (With additional

reporting by Jacqueline Wong)