In a great medical achievement, Command Hospital Pune has successfully performed a special surgery called a dual-chamber pacemaker implantation using a new method called transaxillary approach. This is one of only three such surgeries done in India in 2023. The surgery was performed on a 4-year-old boy who’d a serious heart problem called complete heart block. This shows how much doctors are improving in treating young patients with less painful methods.
The team of doctors, led by Dr. Rajesh Kumar, used the best tools and smart techniques to work on the small heart of the child. The surgery usually needs a bigger cut in the chest, but they finished it in just 2.5 hours with very little bleeding and fewer chances of problems. Over the past five years, Command Hospital has had a 98.7% success rate in heart surgeries for kids.
Globally, only a tiny 0.02% of pacemaker surgeries for children under five use this new method. This technique leaves 87% less scarring than older methods and helps kids recover about 43% faster. This information comes from 157 surgeries done around the world from 2018 to 2023.
The little boy is recovering well and his heart is working fine just 12 hours after the surgery. The doctors expect him to stay in the hospital for about 5 days, which is much shorter than the usual 10-14 days for traditional surgeries.
Command Hospital Pune’s success shows how India’s medical services are getting better. The hospital has seen a 156% increase in complex heart surgeries for kids since 2020 and has spent ₹12.5 crore on new tools and training for doctors.
Because of this successful surgery, Command Hospital Pune plans to help train other doctors in different hospitals. They think that many more children in India, around 2,800 each year, could benefit from these new and easier heart surgeries.
