There was a double celebration at Soroti regional referral hospital following a successful operation of a mother whose baby was implanted in the liver.

Naturally and ideally, the egg travels down the fallopian tube to the womb, when it is fertilized. But Florence Anabo, a 23-year-old mother from Amuria district developed an intrahepatic pregnancy, a rare condition when her embryo implanted itself in the liver.

Anabo was referred to Soroti hospital following a scan that revealed that her baby was implanted in the liver. According to medics in Soroti, the mother had previously had three pregnancies that comprised an ectopic pregnancy, an abortion, and live birth.

She was admitted to Soroti hospital at 28 weeks of pregnancy and monitored for seven more weeks before an operation was conducted on her.

On Tuesday evening, Dr Joseph Epodoi, a senior consultant surgeon led an operation assisted by Dr John Oumo Ekunait, the senior consultant gynaecologist and Dr Irene Chebet, an obstetrician among others. This was the first operation of this nature at Soroti hospital.

Dr Chebet says they conducted a number of tests and consultations with other medics before venturing into the operation. She notes that much as they have conducted two other operations; one implantation behind the uterus and another in the ovary, the latest operation was the most complicated.

"We went to the theatre and under general anaesthesia, we operated. At first, we did not know exactly where the baby was implanted. We thought that perhaps the placenta was just attached to the liver and the baby was on top until we got him and found the whole abdomen up to below the underlying parts was filled with the liver. When we opened we found the baby below the liver...The surgeon came in and approached from the lower bile of the liver, he opened a delivered a baby girl of weight 1.5kg," said Chebet. 

Dr Joyce Moriku Kaducu, the state minister for Primary Health Care who heard the news while officiating at the discharge of eleven recovered patients of COVID-19 in the hospital said the successful the operation was a milestone in the health sector performance in the country. Agnes Akajo, an attendant to the mother says she had lost hope when they were told that the baby was engulfed in the liver.

“Some people here told us that only health facilities outside the country would save my daughter, but I am grateful to God who guided doctors in Soroti to conduct a successful operation. Both the baby and the mother are doing well”, she said.

Credit: The Observer