The Hindu

Mangalore, May 15: A cardiac surgical team from Kasturba Medical College (KMC) Hospital, Ambedkar Circle, Mangalore, led by Sujeeth H. Suvarna, performed a bloodless beating open heart surgery on a patient.

The KMC team consisted of four cardiologists and three cardio thoracic surgeons.

According to a press release from Sunil Deshpande, chief operating officer, KMC Hospital, here on Monday, the team operated on the 70-year-old patient Felix D'Cunha of Mangalore.

Diagnosis

Mr. D 'Cunha was diagnosed with coronary artery disease, poor heart function, recurrent pulmonary oedema and a failed coronary artery stent procedure.

Dr. Sujeeth and his team along with medical support from his interventional cardiologist colleague Padmanabh Kamath undertook this challenging procedure.

Traditionally, a heart operation involves the transfusion of two to four pints of blood, four or more pints of plasma and two to four units of platelets.

Additional blood is needed to prime the heart-lung machine, which keeps the patient alive during the operation. All this was successfully performed without the help of the heart-lung machine and blood transfusion.

Dr. Sunil said KMC has been fully equipped to perform all type of major surgeries in the field of cardiology and cardio thoracic surgery.