An English woman has revealed her horror at finding out her 8-year-old had a hidden vagina.
According to The Sun, Leanne Owen, from Lancashire claims that discovering her son who is 8-years-old had a hidden vagina caused her to miscarry her pregnancy.
According to the 40-year old mum, her eight-year old son, Harry Blunden, had a rare condition which included bifid scrotum and urethral duplication in May 2015, after doctors had spent years searching a diagnosis.
Owen later discovered she had miscarried her baby a month later, about the same time she had received the shocking news about Harry’s genitalia.
“When I went in for my first pregnancy scan, they found blood in my urine and I was told that I had lost my baby at six weeks.
“I was devastated and when I went back and tracked the weeks back, that would have made it to around May 18 last year – which was the same week that I was told that Harry had a vagina,” Leanne explained.
Even though Harry was born with defects which include no anus, no urethra hole in his penis and three holes in his heart, the bifid scrotum which involves a deep cleft dividing his scrotum and turning into a labia, was only discovered a year ago.
Harry who has undergone 12 surgeries and given a colostomy bag, also had severe dyspraxia, a twisted spinal cord and kidney problems.
However, his lack of penis growth was grave concern for his mother, for a diagnosis for her son’s condition.
She was even more shocked when she discovered that, apart from her 8-year old son having bifid scrotum which associated his genitalia to a vagina, he also had a non-random co-occurrence of multiple birth defects, a phenomenon given the acronym, VACTERL association.
“I knew there was something internally that was wrong with Harry as well as the other defects that were picked when he was born.
“I’ve spent the months since joining Facebook groups, support groups and asking experts around the world to try and find out what was wrong with Harry.
“When I found out that it was VACTERL association, I just broke down because it was such a huge breakthrough and now we can get the treatment to get him on the right path in life,” she said.
Although Harry has been treated in three different hospitals: Blackpool Victoria since birth, Manchester Children’s Hospital and Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, Leanne had recently complained to the Manchester hospital after Harry allegedly had a loop stoma that leaked for five years, following an operation to revert back to that method of waster removal.
Leanne, frustrated, has claimed that the positioning of the stoma on his hip has caused him to limp. However, she added that it has been since corrected since he moved to Alder Hey in Liverpool.
She also claims that while at Blackpool Victoria Hospital, Harry’s defects had not been detected by ultrasound scans.
“I feel frustrated because if this had been picked up when Harry was a baby, he wouldn’t have to be in the pain that he is now.
“It is horrible when Harry is to go in for an operation because he hates it and we have to physically hold him down because it is the only way that we can get him ready for the operation.
“It breaks my heart as it takes eight of us to get him down there because he is seven stone, but it’s for his own good.
“Harry has always got a smile on his face, which is amazing when you think of all that he has been through.
“If you looked at him, you would never guess that there was anything wrong with him because he is such a happy little boy who loves to sing and dance, and everybody in the local area knows him like a celebrity,” she said.
According to a spokesperson for Manchester Children’s Hospital, the hospital would be investigating Harry’s case further.
He said:
“We are sorry to hear that Harry’s family have concerns about his care.
“We are contacting the family to reassure them that we will look into this further.
“We would like to reassure Harry’s family that we are committed to providing an excellent standard of patient care and will ensure that their concerns are investigated fully.”
A Blackpool spokesperson also spoke, saying that they have reacted to Leanne’s concerns directly.
“We are always sorry to hear about any issues involving patients but we cannot comment on individual cases due to patient confidentiality.
“We have investigated the family’s concerns and responded to them directly.”
