India

Indian doctor removes ‘rare’ cancerous tumour from African infant’s brain — India News

Ayr­ton Timm de Oliveira and Edwina, both 26 and from Mozam­bique, were dev­as­tat­ed when their infant son and first child, John (name changed), began expe­ri­enc­ing major vision loss, delayed growth and feed­ing dif­fi­cul­ties. He is a ten-month-old baby.After pre­sent­ing their child’s reports to sev­er­al Indi­an hos­pi­tals, the par­ents were informed that their child had a mas­sive brain tumour. Symp­toms such as insuf­fi­cient oral food con­sump­tion result­ed in the child remain­ing under­weight and con­stant­ly cry­ing. The tumour was 7x8x9 cm in size and took up one-third of the brain.The cou­ple trav­elled to India in an attempt to save the baby, where Dr Harshil Shah, a well-known neu­ro­sur­geon at Ahmed­abad’s Shal­by Hos­pi­tals, per­formed a five-hour surgery.Dr Shah said, “They [par­ents] did a CT scan in Africa and the basic diag­no­sis revealed it to be a large, ini­tial stage 2 can­cer­ous brain tumour. Every hos­pi­tal they had gone to told them that the mor­tal­i­ty rate was high. Shal­by Hos­pi­tal was able to not just detect but also per­form the lengthy and com­pli­cat­ed surgery.”“The male child was suf­fer­ing from a rare chi­as­mal tumour. This tumour aris­es from the optic nerves that were affect­ing the brain, which I was able to diag­nose on time. This is the rea­son that the child was not able to see even objects that were close to him due to an affect­ed vision,” said Dr Shah.“Post-surgery, the child’s food intake increased, and he gained three kg. He was nutri­tion­al­ly defi­cient. How­ev­er, the patient is now doing well and is com­plete­ly nor­mal,” said the doctor.“Surgery and com­plete tumour removal have a very low suc­cess rate, and patients with no deficit are extreme­ly rare. I’ve nev­er seen such a large tumour, let alone in a child,” he added.READ | Boy goes for nasal surgery, doc­tor per­forms her­nia oper­a­tion instead­WATCH | Meet the IAF doc­tor who revived can­cer patient after she suf­fered car­diac arrest on Kolkata-bound flight