On the 4th of this month local time, Alex Simpson from Omaha, Nebraska, USA celebrated her 20th birthday. This seemingly ordinary birthday party amazed the medical community.Because she was born with an extremely rare form of "hydranencephaly", doctors had predicted that she would not live to be 5 years old..
When Alex was born, parents Sean and Lorena thought she was a healthy baby until a physical exam two months later confirmed the tragic news.
After examination, it was discovered that Alex's brain was almost non-existent.Only a little fingernail-sized brain tissue remains at the base of the skull, and both cerebral hemispheres are completely missing and replaced by sac-like structures filled with cerebrospinal fluid..
The medical team informed the Simpsons that their daughter had a medically almost unsurvivable disease and could only live to be 4-5 years old at most, and it was recommended to give up treatment. However, the Simpsons did not give up on her.
Although Alex lacks the areas of the brain responsible for vision and hearing, her family believes that her sensory abilities are beyond imagination:
Whenever her father, Sean, came home from get off work to talk, she would turn her head to look for the direction of the voice and smile; when someone was in a bad mood, she would become restless; when grandma's back hurts, she would also become restless.
The medical community was also surprised that he could live for 20 years and set a new record. After research, it was believed that one of the important reasons was the meticulous care of his family.
