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14岁的海地女孩马莉·卡苏斯于12月14日在美国迈阿密经历了一场极为罕见的外科手术。医生从卡苏斯脸部切除了一个重达16磅（约7.7公斤），使她脸部严重变形的肿瘤。
据美联社12月15日报道，卡苏斯是5年前患上这种疾病的，随着年龄增长，她脸部这个肿瘤也越来越大，并影响到了她的呼吸功能。今年9月份，一个非营利性组织将她带到了美国寻求治疗。
参与此次手术的共有4名医生，美国迈阿密大学医学院的杰西·戈迈兹医生就是其中之一。戈迈兹说，卡苏斯患的是多骨纤维性发育不良症（polyostotic fibrous dysplasia）中罕见的一种。这是一种非遗传性的基因疾病。医生们还表示，必须尽快实施手术，否则卡苏斯可能会双目失明。
报道说，迈阿密霍尔兹儿童医院的医生们于当地时间14日晚上11点40分左右完成了手术，手术用了将近16个小时的时间。但这个手术仅仅是个开始，为了恢复容貌，卡苏斯还不得不接受更多的手术才行。
手术前戈迈兹曾说，医生将从卡苏斯的左脸开始手术，并且把导致她脸部拉伸变形的球状纤维组织切除掉。如果此次手术成功，医生们还将设法重塑她的右脸和肿胀的下巴。
此前医生曾进行过类似的手术，但是很少遇见如此之大的肿瘤。戈迈兹说，世界范围内，在15万人患有这种疾病的人中，只有大约3％的人会遭遇到这种情况。
手术前，卡苏斯的脸部已经肿胀得非常厉害了。在她整张脸上，只有眼睛、鼻孔和一个牙齿能被辨认出来。因为面貌丑陋，卡苏斯常受到歧视。据戈迈兹表示，“人们曾像对待动物一样对待她。如果她走在马路上，人们看到后都会躲开绕着走。”
医生还表示，为完全恢复卡苏斯的容貌需要筹集到9.5万美元的捐款，但目前还未筹集好，医院仍在筹集。
A 14-year-old Haitian girl underwent a rare operation Wednesday to remove much of a 16-pound tumor-like growth on her face that all but obliterated her features.
Doctors at Holtz Children's Hospital finished operating on Marlie Casseus about 11:40 p.m., nearly 16 hours after the procedure began. The surgery is the first of many she will have to undergo.
A nonprofit group brought Casseus to the U.S. in September after the painful growth became so big it began to crush her breathing passage. The doctors are donating their time.
"I don't know how to thank you for this," her mother, Maleine Antoine, told doctors through a translator at a news conference. "I cannot express my emotions."
Casseus suffers from a rare form of polyostotic fibrous dysplasia, a nonhereditary, genetic disease that causes bone to become "like a big a bowl of jelly with some bone inside," said Dr. Jesus Gomez of University of Miami School of Medicine, one of the doctors involved in the operation.
Doctors said it was necessary to operate immediately or she would go blind.
Gomez said doctors would start with the left side of Casseus' skull and carve away the ballooning fibrous mass that had stretched and distorted her face, spreading apart her teeth.
If the operation is successful, they will seek to reconstruct the right side of her face and then later reconstruct her swollen jaw.
Doctors have performed such operations before, but rarely on a growth so big, Gomez said. Only about 3 percent of the 150,000 people diagnosed with the disease worldwide suffer such an extreme condition, he said.
Back home in Port-au-Prince, Casseus faced not only physical suffering but rejection by her neighbors.
"She was treated like an animal. If she was walking on a sidewalk, people would cross the street," Gomez said. "If they tried to stop a taxi, it would keep going."
The hospital said the $95,000 needed to fully restore Marlie's features has yet to be raised, though some donations have come in from around the world. The hospital is seeking to raise the money through its International Kids Fund.
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