A complex repeat bypass saves a 60-year-old woman operated twice before for coronary artery disease

Nov. 27, 2012 - PRLog -- A complex repeat bypass saves a 60-year-old woman operated twice before for coronary artery disease

A 60-year-old woman suffering from a coronary artery disease has got a new lease of life, thanks to a 20 hour complex ‘redo (repeat) bypass’ surgery with seven grafts that she underwent at Mumbai based Asian Heart Hospital (AHI) in October.

After one bypass and an angioplasty since last three years, KamleshSinghla, was hoping that her heart ailment won’t resurface. However, in August this year she again suffered severe chest pain.  She started facing difficulty in breathing which was not associated with chest pain, giddiness, nausea or vomiting. To her horror, a CT angiography test revealed that all her major arteries had 100 percent blockages and her heart pumping was reduced to bare minimum.  

“Patient came to us within just two years after her bypass surgery and angioplasty. Generally after a bypass, such major blockages occur only over a period of 10-15 years.  All the heart interventions had failed due to very thin coronary arteries (1mm) and only 20 percent heart pumping,” said Chief Cardiac Surgeon & Vice Chairman & Managing Director of AHI, DrRamakanta Panda, who in 2009 had successfully performed a redo bypass surgery on Prime Minister DrManmohan Singh.

In a healthy person, 2mm is considered as the normal size of coronary arteries. People with a healthy heart have an ejection fraction (EF) of about 60 percent, while people with heart failure have an EF of 40 percent or less. Ejection fraction is the amount of blood pumped out divided by the total amount of blood in a filled ventricle.

“In the last three years, hospital had literally become my second home due to my repeated hospitalisation. My weak heart had restricted my activities as I used to get breathless with just five minutes of walking,” remembers Singhla adding, “We consulted top surgeons and hospitals in Delhi, Chandigarh and USA and all on them refused to perform redo bypass surgery on me stating that it was extremely high risk procedure for someone like me.”

Besides her heart problem, Singhla also had hypertension, diabetes and hypothyroidism.

After three months of running around, Singhla family got in touch with Dr Panda at Asian Heart Institute, who finally agreed to operate on Singhla for a redo bypass procedure.  “It was a complex procedure and the patient was in seriously bad condition. There was water accumulation in her lungs. There was no guarantee that the patient would survive, but not operating was not an option. We did seven grafts in this 20 hour surgery,” added Dr Panda.

Singhla was operated on October 5 in AHI.  “Now I am feeling much better as my chest pain is gone. Also I don’t feel breathless while walking. I have even started doing limited exercises,” said Singhla on October 25.

For more information, please contact:
Atul Malikram
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