Girl who had limbs removed leaves hospital

Published 9:26 pm Saturday, December 15, 2007

BANGALORE, India — A 2-year-old girl who was born with four arms and four legs left a hospital in southern India on Saturday, little more than a month after surgeons successfully removed her extra limbs.

The surgeon who led more than 30 doctors in the marathon surgery said Lakshmi was making good progress and should be mobile soon.

She was born joined at the pelvis to a “parasitic twin” that stopped developing in her mother’s womb. The surviving fetus absorbed the limbs, kidneys and other body parts of the undeveloped twin.

Lakshmi had been revered by some as an incarnation of the four-armed Hindu goddess she was named after.