CHENNAI: A woman who was six months pregnant underwent a life-saving surgery at a city hospital that managed to ensure not just the safety of her child and herself, but also that she could walk within two days. Sarah*, a resident of Nagercoil, hailed from a family of doctors. She was pregnant with her first child and was gearing up for the Christmas season when she began experiencing shortness of breath and increased palpitations. An MRI scan revealed that she had a congenital condition called eventration of the diaphragm, which meant that her diaphragm was like a thin sheet instead of a thick muscle from birth,” explained Dr J S Rajkumar, chief surgeon, Life Line Hospitals. “As her child grew inside her womb, it pushed the liver against the diaphragm and this caused the lungs and heart to compress and shift to the left side,” he added. After a quick consultation, they arrived at the hospital in Perungudi and within 24 hours” nine doctors from various disciplines had reviewed her status and were ready for the surgery. “We had to thicken her diaphragm using ‘pleats’ without harming her daughter inside,” said Rajkumar. “We combed journals and medical records but no such case had been successfully operated on in the past,” he added, stating that in the USA and Spain, successful operations had been done, but those involved making a nine inch incision in the woman’s chest.The odds were against them as globally there was a 60-85 per cent fetomaternal death rate by medical standards. “We went ahead with multiple incisions instead of one big hole and pleated the diaphragm in five rows,” he said. This would make it almost 90 per cent as thick as a normal person’s. After a three-hour procedure, throughout which the baby’s heart and vitals were monitored, her condition stabilised and doctors breathed easy.
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