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In a tricky surgery doctors at a city hospital have removed a large tumour from the heart of a 22-day-old baby. The occurrence of tumours in the hearts of newborn babies is extremely rare, and this particular type of large tumour has never been reported before, surgeons who operated on baby Asiffa, said.

“The growth was a `leiomyoma', which is a type of tumour usually found in the uterus. (uterine fibroids) Finding this kind of tumour in a baby's heart has never been reported before,“ said Dr K.R. Balakrishnan, director of cardiac sciences at Fortis Malar hospital, where the surgery was performed. A day after baby Asiffa was born, doctors realized that the infant was extremely sick. She was not breathing properly, and turned blue.

“She was brought here when she was two days old, and we diagnosed the large tumour, that was crushing the chambers of the heart and other organs in the chest area. The baby weighed hardly 2.5 kilos at birth, and her blood pressure was as low as 40 to 50 mmHg. The oxygen content in her blood was only 30 per cent,“ recalled Dr Balakrishnan.

When specialists told the infant's young parents that she needed immediate surgery, they took her back home, as they wanted to consult the elders in the family. 20 days later, they brought the baby girl back to hospital and agreed to let her undergo the open heart surgery, doctors explained, pointing out that it was a miracle that she survived that long, since the tumour crippled the heart's pumping power.

“We cooled the baby down to 15 degrees to stop blood circulation, as she was too small to be put on the heartlung machine. We opened the heart and removed the tumour,“ the doctor added.

- DC Chennai