Rare combined surgery performed on 72-year-old woman at Mangaluru hospital

Mangaluru: The KS Hegde Hospital has successfully performed a rare, combined surgery on a 72-year-old female patient, who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer as well as critical coronary artery disease.
Hospital sources said that it was a first of its kind combined heart bypass surgery and thyroid cancer surgery done here. The patient was brought to the hospital with a huge swelling on her neck and breathing difficulty.During investigation, it was found to be thyroid cancer with the swelling extending into the chest. On evaluation, the patient was found to have critical coronary artery disease (left main) which required bypass surgery. It was a challenge for doctors to perform these two surgeries.
Doctors from the cardiology, cardiac surgery, endocrine surgery, and cardiac anaesthesia departments discussed and decided to perform both surgeries simultaneously. The bypass surgery took around four hours and thyroid cancer surgery went on for three hours. On post-operative day one, the patient was removed from ventilator support and started conversing. She was discharged in stable condition after one week.
In the presence of cardiac anaesthetist Dr Manjunath Kamath, bypass surgery was performed by cardiac surgeons Dr AG Jayakrishnan, Dr M Gopalakrishnan, Dr Nareshchand Hegde H, Dr Subramanyam K and Dr Anup HS. Thyroid cancer surgery was performed by endocrine surgeon Dr Smita Rao and cancer surgeon Dr Vinay J Rajendra.