The doctors also must consider the possibility of reconstructive surgery and the social and learning issues the twins may have to face after they are separated. Due to advances in neuroimaging, neuroanesthesia, and neurosurgical techniques, successful separation operations have become more common. Physical traits like joined brain tissue, shared arteries and veins, as well as defects in the skull and dura mater complicate a separation operation.Neuroimaging especially plays an important role because it is imperative in surgical planning to understand the shared vascular anatomy—including the brain parenchyma, calvaria, and dura mater—because separating shared vessels can lead to thrombosis, air embolism, cerebral infarction, and hemorrhage. Technologies such as CT scans, MRIs, and angiography are used to map the shared vascular structures. Cases
Emilie and Elisabeth Stoll were born on January 17, 1912. Their parents exhibited them until their death in July 1912. Their cause of death is unknown, but they were probably weakened by the stress of travelling and exhibition. Rodney and Roger Brodie were born in Rock Island, Illinois, in 1951. In December 1952 a medical team led by neurosurgeon Oscar Sugar attempted to separate the 15-month old twins in a surgery that lasted 12 hours. During surgery, the doctors discovered that the twins shared the superior sagittal sinus, the canal that drains blood from the brain to the heart. This vessel was retained by Rodney Brodie. Both twins survived the surgery, although Roger did not regain consciousness and died 34 days later.
Epidemiology
Although all early reported cases occurred in the Philippines, X-linked dystonia parkinsonism has been diagnosed in Japan, US, Canada, and Germany in people of Filipino descent. The prevalence in the Philippines has been estimated at 1/322,000 and as high as 1/4,000 in the province of Capizs male population. As an x-linked recessive disease, the majority of those affected are males with females generally being asymptomatic carriers. In the largest described series, the mean age of onset was 39.7 years, the mean duration of illness was 16 years, and the mean age of death was 55.6 years. History
The high concentration of XDP in the Philippines was first documented in the 1970s after the Philippine General Hospital received 5 neurology referrals labelled as "dystonia musculorum deformans". This sparked an epidemiological survey which was published in 1976. Lee et al. described a series of 28 men, 23 of whom were from Panay Island. She found six families that each had more than one male member affected with XDP and found that there was no male to male transmission. There was also a family history of parkinsonism in some of the patients. The name Lubag is based on the term used by Ilongo speaking Filipinos. It describes any movements with torsion. References


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