UT Health Austin

When two-year-old Milah Faciane suddenly couldn’t stand or walk, her care team had to move fast.

Kevin Kumar, M.D., and Elias Rizk, M.D., neurosurgeons with UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences at Dell Children's Medical Center, helped identify the cause: a tangled mass of blood vessels compressing her spinal cord.

In the operating room, Kumar and Rizk led an intricate, hours-long procedure to open her spine, isolate the abnormal vessels one by one, and relieve pressure on the spinal cord.

After surgery and intensive rehab, Milah began crawling again, then standing, then taking steps — mobility milestones that once felt out of reach.

Read more in People:

2-Year-Old Suddenly Paralyzed After 'Serpentine Tangle' of Blood Vessels Forms Around Her Spinal Cord (Exclusive) A Texas toddler regained the ability to walk after emergency surgery for a rare spinal arteriovenous malformation (AVM) that left her paralyzed from the waist down.

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