Brazilian twins who were conjoined at the head have been successfully separated.
Three-year-olds Bernardo and Arthur Lima - who were born with fused brains - underwent several surgeries in Rio de Janeiro.
Experts spent months using virtual reality to perfect techniques, before the real thing. For the first time in the world, surgeons in separate countries wore headsets and operated in the same “virtual reality room” together.
The final two operations took well over 30 hours, and involved almost 100 medical staff
Dr Owase Jeelani of London's Great Ormond Street Hospital was lead surgeon on the operations alongside Dr Gabriel Mufarrej, head of paediatric surgery at Instituto Estadual do Cerebro Paulo Niemeyer.
Dr Jeelani said the surgery went really well and that they have an excellent team at the hospital.
We are so thrilled to share the news of our sixth set of successfully separated twins!
Meet Arthur and Bernardo from Brazil. Read more about them below!
— Gemini Untwined (@GUntwined) August 1, 2022
Speaking about the VR aspect of the surgery, Mr Jeelani told the PA news agency: “It’s just wonderful, it’s really great to see the anatomy and do the surgery before you actually put the children at any risk.
“You can imagine how reassuring that is for the surgeons.
“In some ways these operations are considered the hardest of our time, and to do it in virtual reality was just really man-on-Mars stuff.”
Mr Jeelani said the boys were recovering well.
Surgeons from @GUntwined worked for 33 hours with the team at Instituto Estadual do Cérebro Paulo Niemeyer to separate Arthur and Bernardo.
CW: Contains surgery footagehttps://t.co/nUWZM3RN9H
— Gemini Untwined (@GUntwined) August 1, 2022
Image: Gemini Untwined
