Modern medicine improves people’s quality of life. However, sometimes, I worry that medicine is helping to homogenize humans. Dwarfs given HGH as children to boost their stature, orthodontia and plastic surgery changing people faces towards a bland prettiness.Â
Since this infant had 3 arms, and 2 were semi-functional, an educated guess was made as to which to remove. I do wonder what would have happened had he been left to grow up with 3 arms. Perhaps like inter-sexed children, he could have been given the choice of whether or not to remove the arm when he was older. Moot point now.
But just imagine him on the piano! Or just how plain handy it would be to have another, well hand.Â
For my previous post on this cutie click here. Like limbs? Click here for the 8 limbed Indian baby girl, the 7 legged lamb with no butthole, the Chinese boy with an extra manhood, and the Indian girl with 2 faces.
Doctors remove third arm from Chinese infant
Last Updated: Tuesday, June 6, 2006 | 9:03 AM ET
A Chinese infant born with an extra limb underwent surgery Tuesday to amputate one of his two left arms.
The arm, which was fully formed, was removed in a three-hour operation.
Two-month-old Junjie is recovering in a Shanghai hospital.
“He is now a pretty good condition, although he still needs some time under observation,” said Dr. Chen Bochang, chief surgeon at Shanghai Children’s Medical Center.
Junjie was born on April 1 with two left arms, neither of which was completely functional.
One arm less developed
Doctors opted to remove the one that was growing closer to his chest after tests revealed it was less developed.
Although his medical team said the operation went better than expected, Junjie will still need extensive help to gain function in his remaining left hand.
“I’m very happy,” said the child’s mother, who asked that her name not be revealed to protect the family’s privacy.
However, she added that she fears for the boy’s future. “I worry about how he will grow, whether this will have a big impact on his growth,” she said.
Rare case
Chen said the boy’s case was a rare one. “We have no record of any child with such a complete third arm,” he said.
“We found the nerves and blood vessels for the arm were formed just as they would be for a normal arm.”
Junjie may need further medical attention, since he reportedly has only one kidney and also may have spinal problems.