A baby in China was born with a 4-inch tail growing from its posterior due to a rare birth defect.
Dr. Li, the deputy chief physician of Pediatric Neurosurgery recognized this rare condition after the birth of the baby at Hangzhou Children's Hospital. He shared the video on social media showing the unusual attachment arising from the baby’s posterior.
Dr. Li presumed the unusual growth was due to the consequence of incomplete degeneration and implied that the child had a tethered spinal cord. His apprehension was ascertained by an MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging). The unusual boneless growth is measured at about 10 inches (3.9 inches) in length.
A tethered spinal cord occurs when the spinal cord is abnormally attached to the wall of the spinal canal. Generally, the spinal cord moves freely inside the spinal canal. When the spinal cord attaches to the spinal canal, this condition can limit movement and cause tension. This tension can induce the spinal cord to extend and may damage it and impede the blood flow to the spinal nerves leading to various neurological problems.
Human tails are rare phenomena with significant cosmetic and psychological effects. A tail is a rudimentary structure representing a vestigial structure found in embryonic life. During the early weeks of human intrauterine life, an embryo has a tail with 10–12 vertebrae. The human tail disappears by 8th week. Clinically speaking, human tails could be associated with spinal dysraphism too, thus the workup would include an ultrasound of the spine in addition to X-rays.Dr. Munish Raizada, Neonatologist, CEO, MedBound Times
This rare condition of the baby gained responses on Chinese TikTok, Douyin. The video was shared on March 11, and it accumulated over 34,000 likes and over 1, 45,000 shares.
The mother of the baby encouraged the doctors to remove the tail, but the surgeons refused to operate on the baby. They inferred that the tail was connected to the baby’s nervous system, if they removed the tail it could cause permanent damage to the baby.
This is not the first case that happened, according to reports from Metro, in 2014, a five-month-old baby Nuo Nuo was born with spinal bifida, a congenital developmental disorder that leaves a gap in the spine. The mother of the baby saw the five-inch long tail a few days after the birth of the baby. A recent case was reported last June in Guyana, South America, where the surgeons removed a tail from a 10-day-old baby. The baby boy is born with an abnormal spine which causes the development of a tail, this condition is called a caudal appendage.
References:
1. https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/24672-tethered-spinal-cord
(Input from various sources)
(Rehash/Lavanya Beeraboina/MSM)