Delhi hospital performs scarless surgery on Uzbek boy

A city hospital has performed a "first-of-its-kind" scarless surgery in the country on an 18-year-old Uzbek boy who suffered from a congenital heart defect.
Toshikinov Doniyor was suffering from pain in the left side of the chest for over two years, doctors at Fortis Escorts Heart Institute, who performed the operation, said today.
"On consulting local doctors he was diagnosed with Atrial Septic Defect (ASD), a birth defect in which there is a hole in the wall (septum) that divides the upper chambers of the heart (atria)," a release by the hospital said.
"This results in blood being shunted into the right atrium besides going into the left ventricle. Consequently, this leads to dilation of the right side of the heart," it said.

The hole can vary in size and may close on its own or may require surgery. In due course, without timely intervention, this causes pulmonary hypertension and ramify in the failure of the right side of the heart, doctors said.
"The challenges were in using minimal invasive instruments putting into heart ports, visibility into the area of treatment, and adopting peripheral bypass to conduct the surgery. With the success of this method we will be able to treat more patients with similar medical conditions in a scarless manner," Dr Yugal Mishra, Director Cardiovascular Surgery at Fortis Escorts Heart Institute, who led the surgery, said.

According to available data, congenital heart diseases as a whole are detected in eight to 10 babies out of every 1,000 live births, the hospital said.

"In India, with the population so large and a birth rate to match, incidences of congenital heart defects are estimated to be enormous. With studies showing almost 10 per cent of infant mortality due to congenital heart diseases, the toll of the burden of heart diseases in children poses a serious burden on the nation.
"ASD itself constitutes for about six to eight per cent congenital heart diseases and is said to occur almost twice as much in girls than boys. This also constitutes for about 40 per cent in adults if it goes undetected until the patient is an adult," release said.

The typical symptoms of this condition are breathlessness while walking or climbing stairs, pain the chest, and inability to walk for a long time or long distances, skipped heartbeats or a sense of feeling the heartbeat.