A Nigerian wins survival battle with the help of GOD and Doctors in India

A 15-day-old Nigerian baby, born with improperly developed food pipe, has successfully undergone surgical correction of her digestive tract at a hospital in Pune, India, Times of India reported on Wednesday.

The baby showed significant post-operative recovery and was discharged on Tuesday.

Baby Chemeire Ibewuike’s oesophagus was not developed, a condition known as oesophagus atresia.

“It is a rare congenital defect, in which the food pipe connecting the mouth to the stomach is shortened and closed (dead-ended) at some point. The condition is called ‘esophageal atresia’. It affects approximately one in 4,000 live babies as in most cases babies get aborted because of the severe abnormality,” said paediatric surgeon Dasmit Singh, who operated upon the baby at Jehangir hospital on February 5.

“Normally, babies with such condition need to be operated within hours after birth. Otherwise the child dies. However, in this case, the child was operated after 15 days of birth. Even then, it has survived and done well,” Singh said.

The mother was delivered of twin babies in Imo State on January 22, of which one died at birth. Two days later the parents were told that the surviving baby had potentially life threatening complications. The father, himself a doctor, was aware that survival rates were very low in Nigeria for babies with the defect his daughter had been born with (undeveloped food pipe).

Through an intermediary, the father contacted Singh, who assured him that the baby can be saved.

The parents reached Pune on February 2.

“Since the baby could not take any oral feed, it was put on intravenous drip. Seeing the baby’s condition, two airlines refused to take us in. All the travel management and journey took eight days. Hence, by the time we reached Pune, 10 days had already passed,” Chemeire’s mother Victoria told TOI.

“The child was rushed to the neonatal intensive care unit, where I and her team had to resuscitate the child as she was highly dehydrated and very sick. All the accumulated secretions were sucked out, the baby was started on oxygen and then investigated,” neona- thologist, Anshu Sethi said.

Singh said, “The baby was in no condition to be operated. She would not have survived the anesthesia and surgery. So, in consultation with the parents, we postponed surgery till her condition stabilized and improved.”