An African Giant Dr. Oluyinka O. Olutoye a Nigerian who is a Pediatric Surgeon and Co-Director of the Texas Children’s Fetal Center operated on this 23 weeks fetus and afterward, he returned the fetus back to the mother’s womb. A field that has worldwide recognition.
Dr. Oluyinka O. Olutoye is a Nigerian who is a Pediatric Surgeon and Co-Director of the Texas Children’s Fetal Center. The Baby That Was Born Twice is an extraordinary story of how Dr. Olutoye performed a life-changing operation on a 23-week fetus. The procedure requires operating on the fetus outside the womb and returning the fetus back.
This was the first time any Doctor had ever performed the procedure in the world, which is usually too risky. But Dr. Olutoye and his team operated on the fetus in order to keep the fetus alive. The surgery was a success, and the fetus was returned to the mother’s womb. The mother and her baby are both doing well and the baby is growing normally. Dr. Olutoye’s work is groundbreaking and has worldwide recognition.
According to Susan Scutti of CNN, the Texas mum Margaret Boemer went for a routine ultrasound 16 weeks into her pregnancy and she and her husband were shocked to learn that her baby had a tumor wrapped around her spine and protruding from her back.
“They saw something on the scan, and the doctor came in and told us that there was something seriously wrong with our baby and that she had a sacrococcygeal teratoma,” stated Margaret Boemer in an interview shared by Texas Children’s Hospital. While the tumor was benign, it was causing serious health problems for the developing fetus. After consulting with Dr. Olutoye, Boemer decided to go ahead with the risky procedure.
African Giant Dr. Oluyinka O. Olutoye, who led the team of surgeons, told CNN “These are babies that are essentially dying, you have a child who’s already very sick, and the operation itself can make her sicker.”. On October 20, 2016, The fetus was removed from the belly for operation. During the middle of the procedure, Oluyinka Olutoye and his team lost the heartbeat which was restarted, she also needed a blood transfusion.
Sacrococcygeal teratoma is a tumor that develops before birth and grows from a baby’s coccyx, the tailbone. Dr. Olutoye and his team successfully removed about 90% of the tumor in an approximately 5 hours operation and returned the baby to her mother’s womb, where she continued to develop for another six weeks before being delivered by cesarean section. Thanks to the skill of Dr. Olutoye and his team, The Baby That Was Born Twice, LynLee Boemer was born healthy and is expected to lead a normal life.
Meanwhile, they had to seal up the uterus in a more clever manner to avoid any danger to the life of both mother and child. The membrane had to be made watertight to enable the type of growth and stretching that will occur as Lynlee continued to grow as the pregnancy process continues.
African Giant Dr. Olutoye explained that watertight care was needed because the risk of Boemer’s uterus rupturing was possible if maximum care was not taken. Therefore, had been advised to stay in Houston, on bed rest, for the remaining part of her pregnancy.
The Baby That Was Born Twice is an extraordinary story. Lynlee continued to grow and the heart pumping better as the tumor was gone. As she was monitored, “Her heart got much better, now that it didn’t have to work as hard pumping through this huge tumor,” Olutoye noted.
At about 36 weeks into the pregnancy, Lynlee was delivered through a c-session, she weighed 5 pounds and 5 ounces and did not look anything like the “small, little gelatinous baby” Olutoye had operated on weeks earlier, he said. He further stated that “Watching Lynlee come out crying and kicking was really very exciting to see,” he said. “Her whole leg during the surgery was barely the size of my finger. They grow so much over such a short period of time.” “You can say she’s seen the world twice,” he added.
“We’re going to get very close,” said Dr. Olutoye. According to Boemer, Lynlee is almost five months and hitting all her milestones, She giggles easily and enjoys being with her sisters, she added.
“LynLee didn’t have much of a chance,” Boemer said. “At 23 weeks, the tumor was shutting her heart down and causing her to go into cardiac failure, so it was a choice of allowing the tumor to take over her body or giving her a chance at life.
“It was an easy decision for us: We wanted to give her life.”
“It was very difficult,” Boemer said. But seeing her toddler smiling with her sisters, she added: “It was worth every pain.”
Who Is Dr. Oluyinka O. Olutoye MD, Ph.D?
Dr. Oluyinka O. Olutoye is the Co-Director of the Texas Children’s Fetal Center and a senior member of the fetal surgery team and a general pediatric surgeon. He has specialized clinical expertise in fetal and neonatal surgery, with a specific interest in congenital diaphragmatic hernia and complex wounds.
He received his medical degree from Nigeria; Obafemi Awolowo University in Ile-Ife to be precise, in 1988 and his Ph.D. in anatomy from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA, in 1996.
He went ahead to complete his residency in general surgery at the Medical College of Virginia Hospitals, Virginia Commonwealth University, followed by his fellowship in pediatric surgery at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia. Dr. Oluyinka Olutoye is also a member of the International Fetal Medicine and Surgery Society and is a Fellow of the Surgical Section of the American Academy of Pediatrics and American College of Surgeons, as well as a Fellow of the West African College of Surgeons.
“An African Giant is someone of African origin who has achieved enormously in a lifetime and is recognized for it. It also refers to someone of African origin with experts’ abilities”. — Africa Giant.
