Kolkata: In a rare medical feat, doctors at a private hospital in Kolkata's Alipore performed a seven-hour-long surgery on a newborn of just 13 days with breathing difficulties to give a new lease of life. After his discharge, the male child was taken by his family to their North Bengal home from where he was brought to the state capital after his body turned bluish.
Kuntal Roychoudhury, the cardiac surgeon at CMRI, Kolkata, explained to ETV Bharat the complications with which the newborn was admitted.
Roychoudhury said the patient was turning blue and was not as proactive as other children of his age. The oxygen saturation level in his blood was measured at 65 and an ECO was performed at the paediatrics department of the hospital which confirmed the presence of a rare disease — Transposition of the Great Artery (TGA). Those who are assailed by the disease can't be breastfed and develop cardiac ailments, he added.
The human heart receives the oxygenated blood through the left arteries and pumps it out through the aorta. On the other hand, deoxygenated blood is supplied to the lungs through a pulmonary artery in the right valve of the heart. In TGA, the arteries were juxtaposed, leading to the disproportionate mixture of blood, Roychoudhury explained.
He further said TGA is inborn but there is no clear concept of its occurrence. In some cases, the unborn child can develop the disease if the mother is intoxicated. Sometimes, the intake of excessive lithium-type medicines during pregnancy can also lead to TGA. TGA can be detected through foetal echocardiography in foreign countries.
The surgery team comprised paediatric cardiologist Shyamajit Samaddar, cardiologist Kuntal Roychoudhury, Dr Prabir Kumar Das and others.
"The operation continued for seven hours and we left the patient unstitched for 48 hours to see whether the producer was successful. He was put on ventilator support for four days after sticking and was discharged after 10 days of observation. Now, he has returned to North Bengal," a surgeon said.
Usually, a newborn with TGA is operated upon within 3-4 weeks of birth as the ventricle would not be able to withstand it in further delay. Any newborn with TGA issue should ideally be operated on within a year of birth as delaying the process entails feeble chances of full convalescence and there are chances of fatalities too. Thus, the time factor is the most important in such cases and doctors are stressing awareness.
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