NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh underwent a successful heart bypass surgery lasting over 11 hours at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences here on Saturday.
After the operation, the Prime Minister was shifted to the ICU. According to doctors, Manmohan Singh is conscious, very stable and responding.
The surgery was conducted by well-known cardio-thoracic surgeon Dr Ramakant Panda, vice-chairman of the Asian Heart Institute in Mumbai.
He was assisted by a group of doctors from AIIMS under the leadership of Dr Sampat Kumar.
Dr Panda said that a total of five bypasses were conducted on Manmohan Singh to overcome multiple blockages to heart.
He said “the Prime Minister was taken to Operation Theatre at 6.40 am. Beating heart surgery started at 8.45 am and got over at 7.30 pm.
At 8.55 pm, he was shifted to ICU. Manmohan Singh had undergone a bypass surgery 19 years back. The surgery will provide a long-term solution and went in his favour as he is a diabetic.’’ Dr Panda said Manmohan Singh has to stay at AIIMS for seven to eight days and no one would be allowed to meet him for the next 48 hours.
To a query on the delay, Dr Panda said “there was no setback on the operation table and since it was a second bypass, the surgery took so long. There were no complications.
He would be more active now than before the five grafts.’’ Dr Panda said “angioplasty is as good as surgery but surgery is a long-term option as there were too many blockages.
The operation went on well. The second bypass always takes a longer time. We didn’t look at the clock.’’ Dr Sampat Kumar said one reason why the Prime Minister opted for an immediate surgery was that he wanted to be ready and fully active well before the elections.
Dr K S Reddy, who supervised the surgery, said the Prime Minister will be able to attend to ‘’some’’ official work in two weeks, ‘’most’’ of the work in four weeks and ‘’complete’’ work in six weeks.