Hydrocephalus

Hydrocephalus is a condition in which there is an accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) within the brain. This typically causes increased pressure inside the skull. The only treatment for hydrocephalus involves brain surgery to insert a shunt to siphon excess cerebral spinal fluid from the brain.

Few outside the medical community have any knowledge of hydrocephalus. The only treatment for hydrocephalus is brain surgery. Felicity had her first brain surgery at the tender age of nine weeks. The only treatment for her, is an implanted brain shunt. A shunt siphons one pint of cerebral spinal fluid out of her brain every day. Shunts have the highest failure rate of any device implanted in the human body. The average life-span of a shunt is two years. A shunt surgery is performed, on average every fifteen minutes in the United States alone.

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