SEPARATED BUT BOUND FOREVER

Siphosethu and Amahle were joined at the skull, but after a risky surgery they’re recovering – and now they love to look at each other

- LESEGO MKHIZE

ALL she wanted to do when her twins were born was to cradle them one at a time and sing them to sleep while they breastfed together.

But that wasn’t an option for Ntombikayise Tyhalisi. Her daughters, Siphosethu and Amahle, were born craniopagus twins, which means they were joined at the head with a merged skull and shared blood vessels.

Now, after cutting-edge surgery, Ntombikayise has her wish. She can cuddle each baby in turn and no longer has to feed them separately.

“I’m overjoyed,” Ntombikayise says. “I wasn’t expecting to leave the hospital holding my children in each arm.”

The successful separation surgery was performed at Cape Town’s renowned Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital. Craniopagus twins are the rarest form of conjoined twins, occurring in one in every 50000 births.

According to Professor Anthony Figaji, the head of paediatric neurosurgery at Red Cross, the birth defect occurs because of the incomplete fusion of a fertilised egg. “Most craniopagus twins are stillborn or don’t survive long enough for surgery to be undertaken,” he says.

Since their birth in January the twins have been in and out of hospital, undergoing a series of tests to see how surgeons could safely separate them.

“In this case, the fact that the connection didn’t involve shared brain tissue or major blood vessels going from one twin to the other [was in their favour].”