Story By: Feza Uzay, Sub-Editor: Marija Stojkoska, Agency:  Newsflash

A baby girl born without an oesophagus and unable to eat has had a new food pipe created from her lung membrane.

Seyma Yildirim gave birth to the little girl in a hospital in the south-eastern Turkish city of Mus on 26th January.

However, shocked doctors discovered that the child did not have an oesophagus during a routine health check.

The baby girl was immediately transferred to a private hospital in the south-eastern Turkish city of Elazig and doctors had to perform life-saving surgery on the newborn only 18 hours after birth.

The operation involved using the child’s pleurae, the membrane that covers the surface of the lungs and the inside of the surrounding chest walls, to reconstruct the oesophagus, also known as a food pipe or gullet.

After a four-hour surgery, the newborn had a brand new oesophagus, thanks to the paediatric surgery specialist Dr Fikret Ersoz.

Dr Ersoz said: “After the birth, the newborn had breathing difficulties and was drooling from the mouth. When these findings were present, our doctor suspected the absence of her oesophagus.”

Thankfully, the baby girl is in a good condition and she will be discharged soon. For now, she will remain under observation and needs to be fed intravenously for seven to 10 days.

According to the surgeon, babies without an oesophagus have no chance of survival without medical intervention.

Dr Ersoz concluded: “It was a complicated surgery that lasted for four hours, but everything is okay now. She will live a normal life.”

Eyip Yildirim, the grateful father, stated that this was their third child and she was born weighing 6 lbs.

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