Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals, Delhi successfully treats a 42-year-old Tanzanian police officer for a big ball of clots in her heart and both lungs

A team of experts at Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals, New Delhi successfully blessed Mrs. Jane Gumbo, aged 42 with a new lease of life. Mrs. Gumbo is from Tanzania and duly serves the nation as a Police officer. She weighed 123 kgs and was suffering from deep vein thrombosis, clot in heart and pulmonary embolism. She had a big ball like clot in her heart which was in the ventricle almost at the verge of blocking the pulmonary artery (the main artery which goes from heart to the lung) and lungs were studded with blood clots. Considering her critical condition and very poor chances of survival, surgeons turned her down for surgery as it was very high risk for open heart surgery. But a team comprising of Dr. (Prof.) N N Khanna- Senior Consultant, Interventional Cardiologist &Endovascular Specialist, Dr Suranjit Chatterjee- Senior Consultant, Internal Medicine and Dr. Nalin Nag- Senior Consultant, Internal Medicine, Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals successfully saved her through a novel technique and an incision free procedure.

Explaining about the disease the patient was suffering from Dr. (Prof.) N N Khanna said, “When the patient came to our hospital, she had severe breathlessness and was in cardiogenic shock and had very low oxygen concentration in the blood. Post investigation, we found that she had large blood clots in both legs, a big clot in the right ventricle and both lungs. Considering the criticality of her situation, surgeons refused to operate on her as the mortality rate is high during surgery.”

Talking about the procedure performed Dr. Khanna said, “Firstly, the Femoral Vein was punctured to implant the filter in Inferior Vena cava for preventing the movement of clots from legs to heart and lungs. Later, clot-busting drug called Tissue Plasminogen Activator (TPA) was given by catheters placed directly on the clots to open the blocked lung arteries and to carefully dissolve the clot in the heart under supervision. The procedure continued for 96 hours patiently and meticulously with continuous monitoring of the status of lysis of the clots by imaging and measuring serum fibrinogen levels of the blood to avoid the risk of major bleeding. Eventually, the clots in the heart and lungs got dissolved.”

“This was a highly critical and potentially dangerous procedure. The clot in the heart was of the size of a table tennis ball and if it had moved towards the pulmonary artery it would have blocked the outflow of the heart like a ball valve suddenly and completely and she would have died in less than a minute. Despite being a critical procedure, the patient was not given even a single incision and the entire procedure was through a key hole endovascular technique and post procedure, she recovered in less than 24 hours. She is doing fine now and requires no further treatment except for oral medicines,” Dr. Khanna said further.

Mrs. Jane Gumbo, the patient after the surgery said, “I am really thankful to Dr. Khanna and his team here at Indraprastha Apollo Hospitals. It is only because of them that today I am living a new life. I was in a very bad situation. I was not even able to breathe properly but doctors here treated me even when others surgeons had refused to operate on me. Dr. Khanna explained me all the risks associated with the procedure. Seeing his confidence and belief, I underwent the procedure. For me, he is no less than a god who has given me a new life.”