On Tuesday, March 5 a team of physicians from Roosevelt Hospital’s Center for Endovascular Surgery performed the first of a series of procedures to treat a 2-year-old boy from the Dominican Republic who was born with a disfiguring lesion on his face.

The 1½-hour procedure was the first of three or four that Alejandro Berenstein, MD, Director of the Hyman-Newman Institute for Neurology and Neurosurgery and his comprehensive team will perform on toddler Joel De La Rosa.

Joel’s lesion is a mass that resulted from an abnormal function of lymphatic vessels, small canals near blood vessels that carry tissue fluids to the lymph nodes and back to the bloodstream.  If left untreated, the facial deformity would cause problems for the child throughout his life.  Dr. Berenstein pioneered the treatment for lymphatic malformation about thirty years ago and has been instrumental in helping advance the technology that’s used in these procedures today.

To treat Joel, he used injections of medicinal foam using ultrasound and x-ray guidance to locate the deeper portions of the malformation and treat them without disfiguring surgery or scarring.  Joel’s case was brought to the attention of the New Jersey chapter of Healing the Children, a non-profit organization that provides medical access to children around the world whose parents cannot afford treatment.

Since his arrival in August 2012, little Joel has been staying with his host family, The Tuortos, of Hopewell, New Jersey.  Dr. Berenstein and Roosevelt Hospital donated their services to provide this life-changing surgery.

Click here to read more about Joel’s journey.