Rare Operation Saves Second Twin Boy

The old saying about beauty being in the eye of the beholder was never more true.

The objective onlooker — if there can be such a thing — might conclude that David Adam Moller, with his stick-like limbs, seethrough skin and thoroughly wrinkled body, is not much to look at.

But to parents, doctors, nurses and anyone who gets close to him at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, David — all 2 pounds, 3 ounces and 15 and a half inches of him — is beautiful simply because he is alive.

David was born last week, 12 weeks premature.

David’s twin brother, Daniel, was removed from their mother’s womb in a rare operation on July 25 but died two days later.

The procedure, called a hysterotomy, became necessary when the twins’ circulatory systems became entwined.

The surviving twin remained inside his mother until last Wednesday.

Listed in serious but stable condition, David has been given “a very good chance of surviving.”

According to his doctor, the baby will probably be allowed to go home in two and a half to three months barring any complications.

The child’s delivery was not announced until Monday when his parents, Patricia and Randy Moller of Valencia, held a press conference.

“I’m just happy I have a son who is alive and going to make it,” said Patricia Moller, who was released from the hospital Monday night after a seven-week stay.

Before the hysterotomy, the twins had been suffering from a condition called twin to-twin transfusion, which occasionally strikes identical twins.

In this case David’s umbilical vein became connected to one of Daniel’s umbilical arteries.

The result was that Daniel’s heart pumped blood into David, leaving the latter weak and the former with excessive fluid in his system.

According to doctors at the hospital, both babies would have died without the operation that removed Daniel.

Deciding on the risky procedure was not easy for the Mollers, who have two daughters.

“It was a scary decision because I’d have to have two Caesareans in a short time. Finally, I just left it to my husband,” David’s mother said Monday.

But with the condition of mother and fetuses deteriorating, there was not much of a decision for Randy Moller to make.

“It was hard at first,” Moller said, “but the options became clearer…”

Ideally, David would have remained in the womb longer, but his delivery became necessary when his mother’s amniotic sac ruptured.

Hysterotomies have been performed on single babies, but according to Dr. Khalil Tabsh, director of high-risk obstetrics at Northridge, this was the first-time the technique was used in an attempt to save twins.

All eight of the previous twinto-twin cases the doctor had treated ended with the death of both infants.

Unimpressed by all this and more, David yawned as wide as his tiny mouth could stretch yesterday as he was awakened for yet another press conference.