Little Brayden Ellis has a smile that warms your heart.
"He is happy. He is content. He is just happy to be here," said Brayden's mother, Bridget Ellis.
Halfway through Ellis' pregnancy, doctors told her that her baby had spina bifida, a birth defect that can cause permanent neurological damage. The Ellises opted for cutting-edge surgery before Brayden was born.
"We knew in our hearts that it was the right decision to make," said Ellis.
During fetal surgery, doctors make an incision in a mother's abdomen and expose the baby's spine.
"The goal is to be able to seal the spina bifida lesion before birth to protect the delicate spinal cord from the amniotic fluid," said Dr. N. Scott Adzick, surgeon-in-chief of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
Doctors then seal the uterus and mother's abdomen to allow the baby more time to develop.
CHOP researchers studied the results of 100 fetal surgeries from 2011 to March 2014 and found in 71 percent of the babies, surgery completely reversed a life-threatening complication, called hindbrain herniation, which causes fluid buildup on the brain.
"It's really in a way, a new standard of care option for families," Adzick said.
For the Ellis family, it means celebrating Brayden's milestones and waiting for his first step.
"It's an amazing miracle that we never knew was possible," Ellis said.
The new Children's Hospital of Philadelphia study also found the fetal surgeries were much shorter in duration than those studied in an earlier national trial.
Mothers were also less likely to require a blood transfusion at time of C-section delivery.
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