Dallas, Oct 21: One of the separated Egyptian twins sat up for the first time in his life and a medical team in Dallas was set to remove his brother from a mechanical ventilator, doctors said on Monday.
Dr. James Thomas, director of critical care at Children's Medical Center in Dallas where Ahmed and Mohamed Ibrahim were separated on Oct. 12, said the 2-year-old boys were following a different path to recovery. They were both in remarkable condition after being separated at the crown of their head by a team of 18 doctors in a 34-hour operation, he said.
Mohamed, who has recovered at a quicker pace, was able to sit up with the help of a therapist. Due to the way the boys were joined at the head, it was impossible for them to sit, and without separation surgery, they probably would have never been able to walk.
"Because the boys are twins, people focus on their similarities and expect them to follow similar clinical courses," said Thomas. "However, the two boys are different in many ways, including their responses to complex neurological surgery."

Thomas said doctors were hoping to take Ahmed off a mechanical ventilator on Monday. Mohamed was removed from the device on Sunday and has been a bit more alert than his brother.
Both boys were listed in critical but stable condition and they are both running a low-grade fever. Thomas said doctors may soon upgrade the boys' condition to guarded from critical.
It will take weeks to see if the boys suffered any brain damage from an operation where a team of five neurosurgeons separated brain material they shared as well as the shared circulatory systems that feed blood to their brains.
One of the major challenges for doctors will be reconstructing the area at the top of their heads where there is no skull -- but there is a flesh covering. Both boys will soon be fitted for protective helmets.
"Compared to their dramatic improvement of the past week, the twins' progress now may seem slower," Thomas said.
The boys were born in a town 500 miles south of Cairo on June 2, 2001. Bureau Report