In one of the rare cases in medical surgeries in Kerala, the skull of a 21-year-old girl was replaced by an artificial titanium mesh here in Kochi.
The surgery was conducted by surgeons at the Ernakulam Medical Centre. According to neurosurgeon Dr A V Sreenivas, who is one among the doctors who led the surgery on the girl who hails from Kunnamkulam, it is very unusual to replace a skull with an artificial mesh whenever the defect is large.
“There have been instances in Kerala where artificial skulls have been replaced but these have been done when the defects were smaller,” he said.
He added that the girl had been involved in an accident one-and-a-half years ago when she fractured her skull in a road accident at Nedumbassery.
“She had lost a lot of cerebro-spinal fluid. Also, the surgery was very complicated. When we conducted the initial surgery, she was discharged without attaching a large portion of her skull. The titanium mesh was placed in two phases. The first phase was completed in April while the second phase was successfully completed last week,” Dr Sreenivas said.
Anasthesia HoD Dr Mathew Varghese and Dr Murukesh Sukumar was also part of the team.