Feb 3, 2006 5:03 pm US/Central
Conjoined Twins Return To Hospital
Fargo, N.D. (AP) ―
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Abby and Belle Carlsen
CBS
Conjoined twin girls Abby and Belle Carlsen are back in a Minneapolis hospital after one of them developed a lung infection.
Their parents, Amy and Jesse Carlsen of Fargo, N.D. said Abby was put on oxygen, and Belle seemed to be coming down with the same illness.
"I didn't really think they'd fly them out to the (Twin) Cities," Amy Carlsen said. "I thought they'd check them out and send them home with us. And then at first, the flight nurse came in and said I might not be able to go on the plane with them. I started to cry. I said, 'You can't take them away from me."'
Jesse Carlsen said Abby was working so hard to breathe that she was unable to eat.
"Any baby would have spent a couple nights in the hospital for this," he said. "They just weren't sure how to take care of it in Fargo, I think."
A spokeswoman for Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota confirmed Friday that the girls were in Minneapolis, but said she could not release information about their condition.
The illness could delay an exam scheduled for next week, which was supposed to help doctors set a date to separate the twins.
The girls were born in late November at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. Preliminary studies showed they are joined at the breastbone, liver and part of their intestines, but they have separate hearts and other vital organs.
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According to the Mayo Clinic, conjoined twins are extremely rare, occurring once in every 200,000 births.
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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