Like all two-year-olds, twin sisters Eva and Erika Sandoval are excitable, playful, and beginning to develop mentally and physically. But their progress is tinged with tragedy.
Eva and Erika are conjoined twins, attached from the sternum down to the pelvis. They share a digestive system, a uterus, and a third leg with a seven-toed foot. As they grow, they are experiencing more and more health concerns. They have been hospitalized with dozens of urinary tract infections and countless cases of dehydration. Now, their parents Aida and Arturo have made the painstaking decision to attempt separating them - in a procedure that carries a 30 percent risk that either will die. Eva will likely keep their bladder, while Erika gets a colostomy bag. Erika, the weaker twin, may keep their third leg while Eva gets the other two. Both will be missing vital body parts; both will need significant reconstruction of their lower bodies. It is one of the most complicated procedures surgeons at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford have ever faced - so complicated that the operation keeps getting pushed back.
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