JOIN USWhen a 47-year-old homemaker visited a doctor complaining of frequent heart attacks, what was initially thought to be a heart disease that could be cured with a bypass surgery turned out to be one of the rarest cases in medical history.
Shirjan from Shimoga was successfully treated by the doctors at Fortis Hospital, Bangalore, for Coronary Cameral Fistula, which was the sixth such case to be recorded across the globe, according to the USA’s National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBT).
Dr Rehan, senior consultant, cardio-vascular thoracic and minimally invasive cardiac surgeon, said that normally the coronary artery that supplies blood to the heart is found on the surface. However, the rare congenital condition of Shirjan was not so. The right coronary artery entered the heart creating a shunt. The coronary artery entered the heart at three different points.
“In this case, an artery had entered into the heart creating a shunt. The shunt allowed excessive blood to flow into the heart. This resulted in increase in the lung pressure (pulmonary hypertension) which, if left untreated, would result in an early death,” said Dr Rehan. In other cases reported in the NCBT, the artery entered the chamber at one spot, while in this case, there were three, among which two were thinned out.
Adding to the existent complication, the woman also had an associated problem of swollen artery. Shirjan’s right coronary artery had grown 10 times the usual size. While the normal size of an artery is 2 mm, in her case the artery was almost 2.2 cm in diameter.
“There were two areas of blowouts in the artery making death from rupture imminent, if not operated upon on. The blowouts were first closed and strengthened, the abnormal connections were closed and all along we made sure the coronary artery was not damaged and its supply was maintained intact. Shirjan is doing fine now,” the doctor added.
Jawed, Shirjan’s son, said that initially the condition was not diagnosed in their hometown. “My mother was feeling uneasy for the past three months . We took her to a local doctor. Little did we know that it would be this rare a condition,” he said.