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Surgeons Remove Half Of Aledo Girl's Brain

  Click here to read Jessie's Blog

BALTIMORE (CBS News) ― The life-saving brain surgery on a North Texas girl has just wrapped up at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Doctors successfully removed half of Jessie Hall's brain today in an effort to save her from a rare neurological disease called Rasmussen's encephalitis.

In a recent blog post, Jessie's parents wrote, "We just saw Jessie come out of recovery on her way to PICU. She is breathing on her own and is moving her right side already. It will be a while before we see anything on the left side. She only lost 2 units of blood - your prayers have been working!  Dr. Carson said she did great and 'expects great things.'"

Dr. Ben Carson, a world-renowned pediatric neurosurgeon, performed the surgery that removed the diseased right side of the 6-year-old's brain.

Today's surgery preparations began at about 6 a.m. Jessie said good-bye to her family and then asked a doctor if she, too, could write on his face as he had just marked hers for surgery.

With a round of High 5's to a CBS reporter in the room, Jessie walked down the hall and then was helped onto the operating table once inside the operating room. Her mother gave her a brief kiss goodbye before the surgery.

Doctors made the first incision at 8:32 a.m. The scalp was pulled back, her cranium was opened and 45 minutes later, her brain was revealed.

Dr. Carson's operating room was quiet. Soft classical music played as he and his team worked without interruption, hour after hour.

Periodically, doctors sent pieces of Jessie's brain to the lab. "It should be fairly reasonable chunks at a time, but it will depend on bleeding," neurologist Eileen Vining explained as she described taking apart the brain.

Doctors removed the temporal lobe and sent it to testing to make sure the diagnosis of Rasmussen's encephalitis is correct. Jessie's parents gave permission to use that portion of her brain for testing.

Doctors started stitching up Jessie's head around 2:13 p.m. She was out of the operating room shortly before 4 p.m. They wheeled her past her parents so they could see her. She then went to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit where she will begin her recovery.

She is expected to be in intensive care for at least 10 days before her extensive in-patient rehabilitation begins.  It could be months before Jessie again walks unaided, but her determination has been an inspiration for her parents.

"She doesn't let anything stop her, so that's very encouraging for us," her mother, Kristi, said.

"The first thing they want to do is get her walking. It'll take weeks, and with braces hopefully we will get her walking again without crutches," Chris Hall, Jessie's father, said in a recent interview.

Without the surgery, the disease would continue to eat away at Jessie's brain and eventually cause her body to shut down, doctors told the family.

"She could have a seizure at any time," explained Chris Hall.

Jessie and her parents chose to travel from Texas to Maryland for the surgery they hope will enable Jessie lead a healthy, normal life.

Since learning their little girl had the disease, the Halls have been able to move forward thanks to unwavering support from their family, friends and entire town of Aledo. The two was decked out in pink ribbons and signs that read, "Pray for Jessie."

Chris Hall also maintains a near-daily blog. They say they have received messages of support from as far away as Iraq and Germany. You can read it here.

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