Parasitic Twin/ Craniopagus parasiticus

We had an interesting foetal malformation delivered in the hospital 3 nights ago. At around 11 in the evening on Saturday, a lady came into the maternity section, in labour but who curiously was not progressing. This was put down to the fact that the presenting part was breech and since her labour was prolonged the patient was sent up to theatre for an emergency C/section to deliver her of the child.

Intra-op on opening the uterus and delivering through the incision, there was a massive mass attached to the occipital area of the foetal head, which forced an extended incision on the uterus to allow its delivery.

As can be seen, there is accessory tissue at the right of the picture, extending from the occipital bone of the otherwise healthy female baby.

At the junction between the normal head and the accessory tissue can be seen the partially formed face of the parasitic twin, including the malformed facial features of a single eye, a single nostril and a deformed mouth.

On examining the patient, as we moved her around, the parasitic twin was disturbed and started to make sucking sounds with his mouth and actually you could see the movement of the mouth and the twin trying to open the eyes. This movement was NOT related to any movement of the normal looking twin and could apparently point to presence of independent brain matter that is in control of the parasitic twin tissue. Here is a close-up of the parasitic twin.

The rest of the tissues appears obsolete and without any visible function. More information on this type of anomaly can be found in the site at Wikipedia and in various other forums.. search for parasitic twin.

If you would like to assist financially or otherwise, this particular patient and his family please contact me through +254 722 223334 or email me at to_arif@yahoo.com