Siamese twin joined in the head successfully separated at four years

Conjoined twins joined at the head have been successfully separated in an operation involving 22 doctors and nurses that was carried out this weekend. The surgery on female twins, Tuqa and Yakeen Al Khadar, who were conjoined since birth was carried out at the Specialist Children's Hospital in the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh.  According to a hospital spokesman, the surgery was actually the fourth and final stage to be performed on the Syrian twins. The spokesman said: 'The hospital has performed preparatory surgeries since April 2014 on the twins', adding that there was a remarkable progress in all the efforts. Dr Ahmad Al-Furrayan, who was in charge of the operation, said it took 10 hours instead of the 12 hours that had been planned and was carried out in stages.

He said: 'The twins were conjoined at the head and that meant this was one of the most complicated and difficult Siamese cases.'
The sisters had been conjoined since their birth four years ago, sharing a skull but not a brain. This means they were craniopagus twins, a phenomenon occurring only once in every 2.5 million births. The success rate for this type of operation is 60 per cent, and Dr Al-Furrayan had been positive it would deliver the expected results. Saudi Arabia has performed 37 surgeries on Siamese twins since 1990 with cases coming from 18 different countries including Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Egypt, Malaysia, the Philippines, Poland, Morocco and Iraq.