Proving once again that Coimbatore is one of India’s finest medical hubs, two leading hospitals of the city – Gem Hospital and KG Hospital have successfully performed one of the rare, most-challenging combined-procedures of this year in the healthcare landscape of India.
Using their combined expertise, the hospitals performed a simultaneous coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) and living-donor liver transplant on a 55-year old male with serious liver disease and heart issues.
Dr.Anand Vijay, Senior Liver Transplant Surgeon of GEM Hospital briefed the press and media about the dual procedure on Thursday.
The patient, according to the doctor, was living with liver disease and it had matured recently. He needed liver transplant for his condition. When he brought to GEM, the team found that he had 3 blocked coronary arteries.
Performing an isolated heart bypass operation on a patient with liver failure carried an extraordinarily high risk of fatal, uncontrollable intraoperative bleeding, as advanced cirrhosis impairs the synthesis of crucial blood-clotting factors. On the other side, proceeding with a liver transplant without repairing the coronary blockage would have subjected the patient’s compromised heart to lethal strain under surgical stress.
Dr.Anand Vijay shared that as the patient had previous consultation with KG Hospital for cardiac-related issues, GEM sought their collaboration to perform this dual procedures. The patient’s wife stepped forward as the voluntary liver donor, matching the required blood group and fulfilling TRANSTAN norms.
After an extensive multi-disciplinary evaluation, the 2 teams anesthesiologists worked in close synchronization. KG Hospital team commenced the bypass surgery in the morning. As soon as cardiac stability was established, GEM Hospital’s transplant surgeons initiated the liver transplantation, working through the evening.
This challenging dual procedure took roughly 15 hours to perform, and it was successfully executed. Both the patient and his wife (the donor) are doing well and have been discharged.
The patient’s wife shared that her husband was non-alcoholic, yet he suffered liver issue. Dr.Vijay shared that fatty-liver disease is a growing concern in the country, and lifestyle modifications is a must to manage it. Even the donor had fatty liver disease and she had to manage her condition so that she could donate her liver.
Dr.Palanivelu, Chairman, GEM Hospital appreciated the patients for their boldness to take on this procedure. As surgical techniques, technologies and post-operative care have improved significantly, patients enjoy better outcomes today compared to what it was before.
