{"id":244279,"date":"2021-05-04T17:41:14","date_gmt":"2021-05-04T22:41:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=244279"},"modified":"2021-05-03T18:05:05","modified_gmt":"2021-05-03T23:05:05","slug":"cincinnati-prenatal-spina-bifida-surgeries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/cincinnati-prenatal-spina-bifida-surgeries\/","title":{"rendered":"Cincinnati hospital reaches groundbreaking milestone in prenatal spina bifida surgeries"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A prenatal surgery pioneered 10 years ago to treat spina bifida has just been performed for the 100th time at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.<\/p>\n

Kelsey Song was 33 weeks pregnant when she gave birth to her daughter, Flora, who had earlier been diagnosed<\/a> with spina bifida. “We were devastated when we first learned that our daughter was not ‘perfect’ and diagnosed with spina bifida,” she said in a press release<\/a>. “But the specialists we consulted with at Cincinnati Children’s were so compassionate, supportive, and enthusiastic \u2013 and gave us so much hope.”<\/p>\n

At 20 weeks, Flora had been diagnosed with myelomeningocele, the most serious form of spina bifida. With myelomeningocele, the backbone and spinal canal push out through an opening in the spine, leaving the baby at risk of life-threatening infections. The spinal cord is also exposed to amniotic fluid, which can impede fetal development, such as what is called a Chiari malformation, where the brain is pushed down through the base of the skull.<\/p>\n

“Children who are born with myelomeningocele can experience serious health problems such as hydrocephalus, which is a potentially fatal excessive accumulation of fluid in the brain, and leg weakness or even complete paralysis. The severity of leg weakness depends on where the opening occurs in the spine,” Charles Stevenson, a pediatric neurosurgeon and co-creator of the Fetal Myelomeningocele Surgery Program at Cincinnati Children’s, said in the press release. “To help these babies have better functional outcomes, we began more than a decade ago performing and refining prenatal surgical techniques to optimize safety and efficacy for both mother and baby.”<\/p>\n

A 2011 study called the “Management of Myelomeningocele Study (MOMS)” found that prenatal surgery can greatly lessen the complications from myelomeningocele, including hydrocephalus. It also can have a greater effect on future abilities, such as leg strength and the ability to walk. Surgeons at Cincinnati Children’s completed the first open repair surgery for a baby with spina bifida in 2011, and Flora Song was their 100th surgery, 10 years later.<\/p>\n