A team of experts led by Dr. Ikenna Omeje, who comes from Nsukka in the state of Enugu, has performed surgery at Vanellope Hope Wilkins, a seven -year -old girl born with her heart out of her body.
Dr. Omeje is a congenital cardiac surgeon consultant and head of congenital cardiac surgery in the East Midlands Congenital Heart Center, University Hospitals of Leicester, United Kingdom.
Vanellope returned to the University Hospitals of Leicester (UHL) NHS Trust for an innovative operation. The team, led by Dr. Omeje, joined during eight -hour surgery at the East Midlands Congenital Heart Center (EMCHC), located in the Real Nursing of Leicester, to rebuild the Vanellope chest. Surgery was essential to protect your heart while continuing to grow.
Vanellope was diagnosed in the uterus with an incredibly rare condition, Ectopia Cordis, in which the heart is located abnormally partially or completely out of the chest. Vanellope, the daughter of Naomi Findlay and Dean Wilkins, weighed three pounds, eight ounces at birth and was delivered by caesarean section at Glenfield hospital in November 2017.
In the last seven years, UHL specialized teams have worked together to monitor their unique case and plan the first operation of its kind, which took place on April 16, 2025.
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The surgical team included the congenital cardiac surgeon Dr. Ikenna Omeje and the Pediatric surgeon Nitin Patwardhan. They were supported by visiting the cardiootoric surgeon Nagarajan Mthialu of the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust.
Dr. Omeje said: “Vanellope's case is completely unique and very rare, so we gathered our experience and combine several different techniques to perform this surgery. I was there seven years ago when Vanellope was born, as part of the team that protected his heart.
“It was a complicated procedure, and it has been a long trip to reach this point, but the feeling of satisfaction you get knowing that you have succeeded is very special. I am happy to be able to help.”
Dr. Omeje graduated from the University of Enoius in Bratislava, Slovakia, one of the most important medicine schools in Eastern Europe.
Subsequently, a scholarship was granted by the Slovak Government for a doctoral program, which completed with distinction.
He then completed his postgraduate training at the Slovak Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases and the Slovak Children's Heart Center.
After his training, Dr. Omeje worked as a congenital cardiac surgeon in the center of the heart of Slovaks in Bratislava before occupying a senior clinical position at the Great Ormond Street hospital for children in London.
Since his time in Gosh, Dr. Omeje has taken many missions of charity to Nigeria, helping hospitals establish or relive congenital heart services. He has carried out hundreds of heart operations in children and adults and has advised local staff in the process.
Dr. Omeje has a great interest in research and teaching. He is the main researcher of the site for OMACP, a study of multiple centers in the United Kingdom that examines the results and risk stratification after cardiac procedures in children with congenital heart disease.
In 2020, he was appointed associate professor of Clinical Medicine and became a member of the Deputy Clinical Faculty of the Faculty of Medicine of the International University of Health.
He is currently an honorary professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Leicester.
Dr. Omeje has written numerous articles in local and international magazines reviewed in pairs.