An Indian-American army surgeon played a key role in an innovative minimally invasive procedure to remove a golf ball-sized brain tumour through a patient's nose, helping avoid open brain surgery.

Major Jagatkumar Patel, an anterior skull base surgeon at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Centre near Washington, worked with neurosurgeon Lt Col Charles Miller to perform the rare surgical procedure on Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Andy Archer, who had lived with the tumour for 15 years.