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surgery

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Surgeons prepared to separate 3-year-old conjoined twins in Brazil using virtual reality.

The things human beings have figured out how to do boggles the mind sometimes, especially in the realm of medicine.

It wasn't terribly long ago that people with a severe injury had to liquor up, bite a stick, have a body part sewn up or sawed off and hope for the best. (Sorry for the visual, but it's true.) The discoveries of antibiotics and anesthesia alone have completely revolutionized human existence, but we've gone well beyond that with what our best surgeons can accomplish.

Surgeries can range from fairly simple to incredibly complex, but few surgeries are more complicated than separating conjoined twins with combined major organs. That's why the recent surgical separation of conjoined twin boys with fused brains in Brazil is so incredible.

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All good parents want their children to live happy and healthy lives. But for parents of sick kids, particularly those with chronic and congenital health conditions, that's a much more difficult goal to achieve.

Unsurprisingly, anxiety is ever-present in both these parents and kids' lives.

As a mother of two children with congenital health conditions, I know first-hand how scary it can be when you’re worried and trying to process the “what if” or expected eventuality of surgery.    

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Johnson & Johnson

Dr. Michael Ohene-Yeboah can still recall the seemingly mysterious ailment that afflicted so many people in his Ghanaian village.

He'd often see the local Catholic priest as he ran around trying to treat those who'd fallen victim to this strange abdominal sickness.

He remembers the howls of pain, how the protrusions in their bodies swelled to the point where they could no longer work, and how, all the while, herbalists and other healers warned them that surgery was too expensive and wouldn't help them even if they could afford it.

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Dignity Health

When Daniel the orangutan arrived at the Phoenix Zoo in Arizona, he was in rough shape.

He was suffering from a respiratory disease, which, just like in humans, can worsen and even lead to death when untreated.

The stakes were high, especially considering that orangutans are a highly endangered species. And respiratory illnesses can be even more dangerous for orangutans which have an inflatable air sac that can be vulnerable when it becomes infected.Located in their throats, these air sacs are helpful in allowing orangutans to sustain the loud calls they're known for by creating a chamber for the sound to resonate within, but these air sacs are also prone to infection.

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