Pregnant woman undergoes rare surgery

MUMBAI: When Shweta Nagwekar (27), in her eighth month of pregnancy, bent down in her office to pick up a piece of paper from the floor a week ago, she didn't realise that she was going to experience one of the rarest complications of pregnancy.
She was diagnosed with 'Adnexal Torsion' in the left side of her abdomen, a condition in which the fallopian tube along with the enlarged ovary gets twisted causing an excruciating pain in the abdomen.
However, a team of doctors at Wadia Hospital where she was admitted on the following day, successfully performed a rare laparoscopic surgery on her. They managed to remove the affected organs from the 27-yearold Kurla resident's abdomen by drilling three minute holes in her abdomen and without affecting the uterus. They claim that it was a first-of-its-kind surgery in India. "Instead of going through the usual procedure of cutting and opening the entire abdomen, we used laparoscopy. The surgery was rare as a laparoscopic approach had never been performed before in such an advanced pregnancy,'' said the dean of Wadia Hospital Dr Adi Dastur.
Nagwekar had told doctors that she experienced a severe pain in the left side of her abdomen on November 4 and fainted in office. She was immediately rushed to a private clinic in Kandivli where doctors felt she was delivering prematurely. However, not convinced, she proceeded to Wadia Hospital for women in Parel. "Her enlarged left-sided ovary and fallopian tube had multiple twists. There was a total absence of blood flow in them and they appeared black and gangrenous. These organs had to be removed immediately as she was suffering from severe pain,'' said Dr Piyush Goyal a laparoscopic surgeon at the hospital.
However, the team was faced with a dilemma- should an open surgery be performed for such a problem? "If the abdomen had been opened, the patient would have been at a higher risk of early termination of pregnancy, risk to the baby, prolonged anaesthesia and probably requirement of blood due to heavy blood loss,'' added Dr Uddhav Raj, another laparoscopic surgeon.
But then the surgery was done laparoscopically by making three small keyholes in the abdomen. "We inserted a laproscope (camera) using a trocar very carefully without affecting the uterus. Using the laparoscopic instruments, we separated the affected parts from the ovary and removed them through these holes. Now the patient can continue with her pregnancy safely without affecting the baby in the uterus,'' Goel told TOI.
Nagwekar is now looking forward to a normal delivery. "I am really thankful to my doctors that I have recovered from such a critical condition. Doctors are saying that the baby is moving well. I am also feeling quite well. I hope everything goes okay now,'' she added. Goel said he would apply for a world record for this surgery. "Earlier a successful laparoscopic surgery has been done in the twenty-fifth week of pregnancy. But now we have done it in the thirty-second week. This has never happened before,'' he added.