NEW DELHI: A 51-year-old man, diagnosed with a chemo-resistant tumour, has received a new lease of life after undergoing a surgery using a Y-shaped trachea-bronchial stent at a leading private facility here, hospital authorities said on Friday.
He had a recurrent chemo-resistant carcinoma in his trachea that extended to carina (tracheal bifurcation) and involved the right upper lobe, doctors said.
A team of doctors, led by Dr Vikas Maurya, director and head of department, pulmonology, Fortis Hospital, Shalimar Bagh performed the stenting procedure recently within a span of 30 minutes, prolonging the life of the patient, the hospital said in a statement.
The patient had few days to weeks to live, and thus the stenting prolonged his life, doctors said, adding, the patient had sought treatment at four different hospitals earlier for his ailment.
"On evaluation, it was determined that he had a recurrent chest infection, shortness of breath and haemoptysis. Despite undergoing chemotherapy, the tumour continued to grow, and the lumen (air passage) was getting narrower on account the same, making it difficult for the patient to breathe. This gave rise to further infection, with blood collecting and oozing from the site," the statement said.
"The case was complicated as we could not treat the patient with chemotherapy right away as it was a chemo-resistant tumour and had infection as well. Also, the patient and his family didn't want any general anaesthesia being given in operation theatre due to advanced nature of disease," Maurya said.
"So , first we controlled the infection and then we put in a Y-shaped trachea-bronchial stent under conscious sedation, in our bronchoscopy suite, thereby covering the tracheal length, carina and upper portion of both right and left main stem bronchi, which covered the growth and after expanding increased the air passage making it smoother," he added.
It was a half-an-hour procedure and gave a new lease of life to him, as he could have otherwise died in few days to weeks due to airway obstruction caused by increasing tracheal cancer growth, the doctor said.
The patient is doing fine now, breathing is comfortable and has been coming to the hospital regularly for regular check-up and is on targeted therapy by medical oncologist, the statement said.