60-year-old Mumbai businessman successfully undergoes valve replacement surgery at Asian Heart Institute

Amid the current COVID-19 crisis, 60-year-old businessman Shailesh Kanani from Mumbai was successfully and safely operated after heart experts at the Asian Heart Institute performed a valve replacement surgery to fix his severely narrowed heart valve and treat the abnormal enlargement that had developed in his aorta- the largest artery in the body

Kanani who was diagnosed with a narrowing of his heart valve in 2006, suddenly started experiencing difficulty in breathing in March 2020 and was rushed to the Asian Heart Institute.

While talking about Kanani's heart condition, Dr Ramakanta Panda, chief cardiovascular thoracic surgeon and vice chairman, Asian Heart Institute shared, “As the patient developed symptoms he immediately consulted me. On reviewing him with a new echocardiogram, it was observed that his valve narrowing had progressed to a very critical level.”

Kanani’s aortic valve was filled with calcium deposits, as a result of which his heart was not able to pump enough blood.

He was advised to undergo a valve replacement procedure, either by surgery or without surgery by way of a minimally invasive procedure called Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement (TAVR). Asian Heart Institute has emerged as one of the leading hospitals for successfully conducting TAVR procedures.

Owing to the best safety record of Dr Panda in valve surgery, Kanani opted for valve replacement by surgery. Dr Panda has successfully performed numerous aortic valve replacements over the years.

Even though the risk of valve surgery in Dr Panda’s hand is less than 1% ,research has shown that if the patient can catch COVID-19 during peri-operative time, it can lead to disastrous results.

To ensure maximum safety to the patient, on admission he was kept in isolation till the COVID test result came negative, said doctors.

9-hour complex procedure

On 18th July, 2020 in a nine hour long surgery, Dr Panda and his team carefully removed the calcium deposits from Kanani’s severely narrowed aortic valve, and a 25mm size tissue valve was inserted in his heart.

“This larger size valve will ensure a longer lasting of the artificial valve as smaller sizes, which he would have received elsewhere, would have risked the valve to fail early,” shared Dr Panda.

While conducting the operation, he was also found to have an enlargement in his main blood pipe (aorta) which was brought back to normal size by removing part of the dilated portion of aorta. “Without this additional surgery, the patient would have come back within the next 3-4 years for another major surgery” Dr Panda added.

The patient had absolutely no complications in the postoperative period and was soon discharged.

Separating COVID from non-COVID for safe treatment

Dr Panda shared that it is important to treat critical non-COVID patients in a safe environment. “We need to lower the spread of COVID and for that we must separate COVID and non-COVID hospitals.

Leading doctors and researchers have always championed the philosophy that having COVID and non-COVID patients in the same hospital leads to multiple issues,” he added.

Asian Heart Institute is contributing to managing COVID patients outside its hospital premises.

For this, the hospital has deputed most of our doctors, nurses and paramedical staff to the MMRDA COVID hospital. “We are treating emergency and government scheme heart patients at Asian Heart Institute,” added Dr Panda.