Aug 1 : The world of medicine has seen and heard it all, but rare cases still have the power to stump the best doctors.
In another such rare case, an Indian baby was born ‘pregnant’ with its twin brother! While half-formed, the male baby – complete with a brain, arms and legs – was discovered by doctors inside his perfectly healthy brother’s stomach after he was born.
Doctors suspect this to be a rare ‘fetus in fetu’ twin pregnancy – one of around 200 ever recorded in the world.
The 7 cm mass was successfully removed from the baby through surgery. According to a report in the Daily Mail, radiologist Dr Bhavna Thorat, who spotted the problem during a routine scan, said: ‘It was inside a fetal sac of the newborn.’
The unnamed baby and his 19-year-old mother from Mumbra, in India, are both healthy and doing well.
Doctors at Mumbra’s Bilal Hospital noticed the abnormality during a routine scan of the mother in early July. Their suspicions came true nine days later after the baby was born, when a scan revealed ‘another small baby’ inside the newborn’s abdomen.
Dr Thorat said: ‘I could see bones of the upper and lower limbs of the fetus.
‘The unique thing about it was I could see a tiny head with the brain inside.
‘However, this parasitic twin didn’t have a skull bone,’ the Daily Mail reported.
The newborn was taken to Titan Hospital in Thane for surgery to remove the 150g mass.
The baby is reported to be in good health and the mother will start feeding him soon.
Fetus in fetu is a developmental abnormality in which a mass of tissue resembling a fetus forms inside the body.
