Jamshedpur : A pre-term 32 week male baby weighing 1.6 kg was delivered at a local hospital and required emergency surgery as soon as it was born due to respiratory distress.
The chest x-ray showed dextrocardia, i.e. heart on the right side of the chest so the very next day after birth, the baby was referred to Brahmananda Narayana Multispecialty Hospital at Tamolia.
X-ray of the chest done at Brahmananda Narayana Multispeciality Hospital showed eventration of the left side of the diaphragm, i.e. elevation of the wall between the chest and the abdomen with dextrocardia position of the heart.
During the operation, diaphragm was found to be lax and redundant, which was plicated and brought down to normal position along with the abdominal part creating a space for lung to expand.
After the surgery, patient�s oxygen saturation in body came to normal with regular breathing pattern. This was a life saving operation otherwise baby could have died because of oxygen hunger (hypoxia) .
Explaining the case, Dr. Perwaiz Alam said, �Since there was persistent de-saturation with rapid breathing and persistent weight-loss, the baby was planned for emergency operation to relieve the respiratory distress and to save his life�.
The team of doctors led by Cardiothoracic surgeon, Dr. Perwaiz Alam included Dr Amitabh Bandhopadhyay, Consultant General Surgery, Dr Pankaj Kumar Gupta, Consultant Pediatric Cardiologist along with Cardiac Anesthesiologists Dr Rahul Debdas, Dr Umesh Prasad and Dr Vijay Kumar.�
It�s a rare abnormality with an incidence of 1 in 10,000 live births. If not operated on time most of the babies will have recurrent chest infection, pneumonia and may die with infection� informed Dr. Perwaiz.
After being shifted to the ICU and initial evaluation with echocardiography, it was found that the baby had a structurally normal heart except for closing PDA – an artery connecting vessels carrying pure and impure blood that usually closes after birth. The left lung was also underdeveloped causing persistent respiratory distress.
�This is a unique case and first of its kind in Jharkhand to our knowledge as this baby is the youngest and smallest baby in Jharkhand to undergo successful thoracic surgery just a few days after birth with such a low birth-weight�, informed Prateek Jain, facility director, Brahmananda Narayana Multispeciality Hospital.
The surgery took around four hours. After a successful surgery, the baby was kept on ventilator support for 48 hours and gradually weaned off the ventilator and kept on Oxygen support for another 48 hours.
The breathing was normalized and the baby was discharged from the hospital on the sixth day with regular follow-up.
