Nine-month-old infant was operated upon at Max Hospital, Saket

Rare surgery saves Nigerian baby

Nine-month-old infant was operated upon at Max Hospital, Saket

Oluwatologo Jeremy, a nine-month-old infant born in Nigeria, was malnourished with a normal birth history. When he was only three months old, his parents noticed that he was having repeated episodes of pneumonia which mostly resulted in hospitalisation.

Just in time: This nine-month-old infant had a hole in his heart.
Pic/Mid Day

During one such episode, when Oluwatologo was playing in his mother's lap, he suddenly started running out of breath. His mother immediately took him to the nearest doctor. The infant was suspected to have congenital heart disease by the doctors and subsequently, and tests revealed a hole in his heart.

"He was malnourished since birth. We observed that he was falling ill on a regular basis. But, when the doctors told us that he has a hole in his heart, we were so depressed. He was our only child and we did not want to lose him," said a sad Lucienda Jeremy.

His father, Nicholas Jeremy was planning to come to the capital for some important work, when he thought to took him to a hospital. He then sent the details about the case of his child to various hospitals in the city.

The baby was suffering from "ruptured sinus of Valsalva aneurysm", an extremely rare condition which globally affects only 0.14 per cent people, and hence a majority of cardiologists never see such a case in their lifetime.
Even amongst the rare 0.14% people, this condition mostly comes to light when a person is in his 20s and for it to be found in a nine-month-old baby makes this a rarest of rare case.

"During evaluation at our centre, he was found to be severely malnourished (weight - 3.8 kg against expected of 8 kg). In view of his condition, he was advised early cardiac surgery. The reports of the child were then sent to our centre and after reviewing them, our team advised early high risk cardiac surgery," said Dr Dagar, Head, Neonatal and Paediatric Surgery, Max Healthcare, Saket.

"The child tolerated this challenging procedure well and was weaned off bypass uneventfully with normalisation of blood supply to the heart. Post surgery, there was a dramatic improvement in the child's condition," added Dr Dagar.

Soon after the operation, Oluwatologo started recovering and he was soon shifted to the other ward.
"The respiratory distress of the child was gone and the fast heart rate and sweating was also gone. With good antibiotics cover, the pneumonia improved. The child was finally shifted to the ward after three days of ICU stay," added Dr Dang.

After the treatment, the child has started gaining weight and is living in good health. The parents are also happy with his recovery "It is great to see him like this. He has started gaining some weight and is living his life without pain. It is a very emotional moment of us to see him like this," said a happy and cheerful Nicholas Jeremy.

Spare the road!

Doctors at the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences extracted a long iron rod from the leg of a 25-year-old man in a difficult six-hour operation.
Sunil, a resident of Tigri Extension in South Delhi, was travelling on the BRT corridor on a motorcycle when he met with an accident. The police said Sunil was on his way from Chirag Dilli towards the Moolchand flyover when he was hit by a car. As a result of the impact, Sunil hit a cyclist who was travelling ahead of him.
The cyclist, Chandan, was carrying the iron rod in the carrier and this rod pierced Sunil's leg. Sunil was taken to the AIIMS Trauma Centre where a team of surgeons operated upon him and extracted the rod after a long operation.

"Exciting news! Mid-day is now on WhatsApp Channels