In a bizarre medical case, a portion of a 90-year-old man’s stomach gets pushed into his chest. According to a team of doctors, the stomach gets inside the chest through a small opening in the diaphragm.
The man was suffering from increasing difficulty while eating. Whenever he ate, he felt heaviness and pain in his chest. According to the doctors, he vomited every time he ate. His condition became of bad that, scared of the pain and vomiting, he stopped eating and lost five kg in 11 days. He gradually also started developing breathlessness.
Desperate for help, the family visited multiple doctors but faced rejection from numerous hospitals, all of which said that he was too old for the surgery and his case too risky, he could not survive the surgery. Eventually, his surgery was performed at the Gangaram Hospital in Delhi.
Fortunately, despite the critical condition the man not only survived but also made a remarkable recovery after undergoing a complex laparoscopic surgery for a large Hiatus hernia at the hospital by minimally invasive laparoscopic (keyhole) surgery.
Dr. Tarun Mittal from the Department of Laparoscopic and Laser Surgery, ordered multiple investigations, including an endoscopy, which showed that he had a Hiatus hernia there was a hole in the muscle that separates the chest and abdominal cavity.
Through that hole, almost half of his stomach had moved into his chest, making it difficult for him to eat. His hernia was compressing his lungs, which caused breathlessness.
During the surgery, the team encountered a large hiatus hernia and severe adhesions around the hernia, making the procedure even more complex. The team of doctors also performed adhesiolysis to free the hernia.
Then, the doctors pulled the stomach back into the abdominal cavity and closed the defect in his diaphragm. They reinforced it with the latest composite mesh. To ensure the best possible outcome, they also performed a fundoplication.
According to the hospital’s statement, the surgery was successful. Despite his age, the patient not only survived the surgery but also began his recovery with remarkable speed.
He was soon started on liquids, began walking the day after surgery. The patient has been discharged now.