JNMC surgeons remove 17-year old’s rare cardiac tumour

Aligarh: Seventeen-year-old, Saba, a resident of Firozabad was weak and emaciated for the past four years. She complained of breathlessness and would fall unconscious. Her life upended after consultations from doctors revealed that she suffered a rare cardiac tumour and financial problems increased the severity of the situation.

However, Saba now sits comfortably with family after a successful free-of-cost surgery conducted by cardiothoracic surgeons of the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Aligarh Muslim University (AMU).

“The surgery was not easy as a clinical perfusionist managed the working of the patient’s heart and lungs for twenty minutes as it was necessary to stop the functioning of these organs for the tumour removal,” said Dr M Azam Haseen, Chairman, Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery.

Dr Azam Haseen led the surgery with team members, Dr Sumit Pratap Singh and Dr Mayank Yadav. Dr Sabir Ali Khan was the clinical perfusionist, while Dr Nadeem Raza provided the patient with the anaesthesia. Dr Harsh, Dr Shahid and Dr Lakshya Vashney took the pre and post operative care of the patient.

Dr Azam Haseen had advised the patient and her family for an immediate surgery.

He added: “In this rare condition, heartbeats of patients either become very fast or very slow, resulting in loss of consciousness.”

Dr Azam Haseen pointed out that it was a challenging surgery as the tumour was arising from the heart valve.

We had to remove the tumour and reconstruct the heart without changing the valve, said Dr Azam Haseen.

AMU Vice Chancellor, Prof Tariq Mansoor congratulated the entire team for their sincere and dedicated efforts.

“More than 400 successful cardiac surgeries have been done in JNMC in the past three years and the CTVS team is constantly providing surgical services despite the pandemic outbreak,” said Prof Shahid Ali Siddiqui, Pricipal, JNMC.

Prof Rakesh Bhargava, Dean, Faculty of Medicine said that JNMC is doing complex surgeries for which patients were earlier referred to hospitals in metropolitan cities.

Well known philanthropist and former Member of Legislative Assembly, Mr Zafar Alam funded the surgery.