Surgeons removed a fragment of a Russian mine from the brain of a boy who came under fire in Kherson

Doctors removed a fragment of a Russian mine from the brain of a 9-year-old boy. The piece of metal was 8 millimeters long.

This was reported by the St. Nicholas Childrenʼs Hospital in Lviv.

Mykhailo Volovykov from Kherson was seriously wounded in the head during the mortar shelling of the city on New Yearʼs Eve — December 31. When the attack began, the boy and a friend were having lunch in a cafe. The children quickly ran into the office, but this did not save them — the debris pierced the walls. Shrapnel hit Mykhailo in the head, and his friend died on the spot.

Kherson doctors provided the boy with first surgical aid, and Mykolaiv doctors performed an operation to remove fragments of the crushed skull. However, the doctors left the mine fragment in the childʼs brain in place — it was too deep.

When Mykhailo regained consciousness, it turned out that the left part of his body was completely paralyzed — his arm, leg and half of his face were immobilized. After several months of daily rehabilitation, the boy began to take his first steps and move more confidently.

However, soon the child began to have seizures. Doctors assumed that they could have been caused by a fragment of a Russian mine that remained in the childʼs brain. Lviv surgeons agreed to perform an extremely difficult operation — the fragment stopped not far from the area that controls the movements of the entire left part of the body.

“We had to find and remove a small piece of metal 5 cm deep in the brain and in a very narrow area. Itʼs like looking for a needle in a haystack. The boy could have been completely paralyzed," says pediatric neurosurgeon Mykhailo Lohva.

Under the control of a microscope and a neuromonitoring system, doctors were able to safely reach the part of the brain where the fragment had lodged, and they managed to remove it. A few days later, the boy regained consciousness.

The operation was successful — the boyʼs motor functions were not disturbed, but a long rehabilitation awaits him. Little Mykhailo dreams of returning home and that his city will no longer be shelled.