Bringing a two-decade struggle to an end, doctors at Prashanth Hospitals performed a rare open-chest surgery on a 51-year-old woman to remove a one kg non-cancerous tumour located between the heart and lung. The four-hour-long surgery performed by a team of expert doctors from the departments of Cardiothoracic Surgery, General Surgery, Pulmonology, and Anesthesiology saved the woman from cardiac and pulmonary complications. The surgery was helmed by Prof. Dr. Vishwanath Pai, Sr. Consultant, Department of Minimally Invasive Surgery, Prashanth Hospitals, Velachery.

Subbulakshmi, a 51-year-old working professional from Chennai was diagnosed with a small mass in her chest upon a general x-ray examination twenty years back. Over the years, the mass grew leading to heart and lung compression risk, which could have led to further complications like breathing difficulties, chest pain, and internal bleeding. While the doctors from other hospitals recommended against the surgical removal of the mass due to its proximity to vital organs, Prof. Dr. Vishwanath Pai and team successfully operated on the patient.

 Speaking about the surgery, Prof. Vishwanath Pai, Sr. Consultant, Department of Minimally Invasive Surgery, Prashanth Hospitals said “I would like to thank all speciality heads and my colleagues from cardiac, pulmonology, and anaesthesia departments to make this happen. Open-chest surgery for the removal of thyroid tumours is very rare in the country. In this case, the risk was high owing to the location of the non-cancerous tumour. If the surgery was not done, the patient could have suffered severe heart and lung complications that could have been fatal. This case is a real example of people understanding the role of early detection to provide timely treatment that will help prevent such near-fatal complications. We are very happy to see the patient relieved from this twenty-year struggle and feeling lighter.”