An eight-year-old girl is recovering after a tennis ball-sized tumor was removed from her neck at a South Florida hospital in what's being called a first of its kind surgery.
Doctors said the life-saving surgery was the first of its kind for a child Brianna Alexe's age, and now almost six weeks after the surgery, she's feeling like herself again.
The Holtz Children’s Hospital doctors removed the tumor growing in her neck that was attached to blood vessels and other vitals. These kinds of tumors are usually seen in adults in their late 30s and early 40s.
Despite the risks of stroke or even death, she came out doing really well. She was walking a few days after surgery and is now back at school, through her vocal cords were affected so her voice is still low.
"We all knew that since we had Dr. Younis and Dr. Hogan that everything would be fine, we were in great hands, we knew it," Alexe said at a news conference Wednesday.
"We were waiting for her, all of us beside mom, to make sure she could move her limbs and knew her name, we've been blessed, everything has been good, this is a great story to tell," Dr. Ramzi Younis said.
