Surgery On Multi-Limbed Girl A Success

Doctors in India completed a grueling 24-hour operation Wednesday on a girl born with four arms and four legs, and surgeons said the 2-year-old - revered by many as a reincarnated goddess - has a chance at a normal life.

The surgery went "wonderfully well," said Dr. Sharan Patil who led a team of more than 30 surgeons at a hospital in the southern city of Bangalore that performed the marathon procedure to remove the child's extra limbs, salvage her organs and rebuild her pelvis area.

"It was a difficult surgery because it was pretty much the uncharted territory for any of us," Patil said on CBS News' The Early Show. "We had to identify each structure and differentiate between what belonged to the parasitic twin and what belonged to Lakshmi."

In her brief and difficult life before the operation, Lakshmi had been both revered as a reborn god and hidden by her parents from people who allegedly wanted to sell her to a freak show, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips. Now she has the prospect of a relatively normal life.

"This girl can now lead as good a life as anyone else," Patil said.

Lakshmi was born joined at the pelvis to a "parasitic twin" that stopped developing in the mother's womb. The surviving fetus absorbed the limbs, kidneys and some other body parts of the undeveloped fetus.

"This is a very rare occurrence," said pediatric surgeon Dr. Doug Miniati at the University of California, San Francisco. Miniati, who was not involved in the surgery, said it was extremely complicated but her chances of survival were greater because she had not been joined with the other fetus at the heart or brain.

The doctors worked through the night to remove the extra limbs and organs. By midnight, a team of neurologists had separated the fused spines while orthopedic surgeons removed most of the "parasite," carefully identifying which organs and internal structures belonged to the girl, Patil said.

Then began the difficult job of reconstructing the girl's lower body.

Patil believes Lakshmi will be able to walk.

"We are very optimistic she should be able to do that," the doctor told Early Show co-anchor Hannah Storm. Also, "she'll have complete control (of her arms) and she uses them normally anyway."

The operation included transplanting a good kidney into Lakshmi from the twin. The team also used tissue from the twin to help rebuild the pelvic area, one of the most complicated parts of the surgery, said Patil.

"Beyond our expectations, the reconstruction worked wonderfully well," Patil said. "We were able to bring the pelvic bones together successfully, which takes away the need for another procedure."

However, she will need more treatment and possible surgery for clubbed feet before she will be able to walk, he said.

Lakshmi's parents "were in tears and overjoyed," Patil said. "The father was the one who reacted. The mother was quite dumbfounded, really, but however, when I took her down just a little while ago to see the child, she was completely overjoyed and had the biggest smile I've seen on a face ever."

"It will be great to see our daughter have a normal body," her father Shambhu, who only goes by one name, told reporters. "We were worried for her future."

Doctors at Sparsh Hospital in Bangalore estimated the surgery cost $625,000, but they did it for free because the girl's family could not afford it.

"We are very grateful to all the doctors for seeing our plight and deciding to help us," Shambhu said.