Seven-year-old Jhonny Lameon was born with a severe facial deformity, which developed into a melon-sized growth which obscured his vision and severely compromised his quality of life.
Not-for-profit group Interplast organised visas and tickets for the Phillipino boy and his mother, funding the flights to Australia where he would receive the pro-bono surgery.
Jhonny had been diagnosed with severe fronto-nasal encephalocele - a neural tube defect that results in membranous sacs expanding through openings in the skull – and it affected every facet of his life, surgeon James Leung said.
“Every time he has to eat he uses another hand to hold up the tumour because the tumour is pretty much the size of a cantaloupe,” he said.
Dr Leung said the defect could have could have caused fatal Meningitis if not treated by the reconstructive surgery performed at Melbourne's Monash Children's Hospital.
Dr Leung described the eight hour operation as a success.
“We had to excise his tumour and reconstruct his face and also do a nasal re-construction using rib-graft to re-create a nose for this young fella,” he said.
Michelle Lyons, a staffer at Children First which housed Jhonny and his mother Cho Chi for seven months, said the transformation was remarkable,
“It's always very rewarding to see the change in the child,” she said.
“It’s just so great to be able to send them back knowing that life will be so much better for them.”
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