Conjoined twins Knatalye Hope and Adeline Faith Mata are planned to get a chance at a normal, healthy life, as they are scheduled for separation surgery next month.
When the twins' parents found out that the girls were conjoined and had only a 20 percent chance of survival they felt inspired to make their middle names Hope and Faith, according to their YouCaring page. Despite the odds against them, they were born at 31 weeks (which is early but not unusual for twins) and weighed a combined of 7 pounds, 9 ounces.
Knatalye Hope and Adeline Faith are connected at the chest and pelvis and share a number of vital organs, including lungs, heart and liver, as well as diaphragm muscles, but their doctors are confident the girls will survive the surgery and walk separately into their kindergarten classrooms in a few years, reported CBS News.
"They are a very challenging set of conjoined twins," Dr. Darrell Cass, pediatric surgeon and co-director of Texas Children's Fetal Center, told CBS News.
Last month the girls underwent preparation surgery, in which the doctors placed custom-made tissue expanders into the chest and abdomens. The tissue expanders will gradually inflate with fluid to help the skin stretch.
The Mata girls' separation surgery next month will require the expertise of 10 surgeons and a total of 30 hospital staff members, reported CBS News.
"I know that we're going be successful at separating them and I know that they're both going to walk into their kindergarten classes just like any other kid. And by the time they get to be that age they're going have forgotten all these processes and everything they went through," Cass told CBS News.
These months of preparation for the surgery gave the twins' parents to mentally prepare to walk out of the hospital with two healthy girls.
"I'm looking forward to it," their mom, Elysse Mata, said to CBS News. "I'm nervous. I'm excited and anxious. And I'm ready to have my two separate babies."
