Tumour on spine removed; baby rests easy

Dr G Balamurali, Spine and Neurosurgeon, said, “She was detected with a very large tumour during the 20th week of pregnancy. The tumour was as big as the child’s head and increased in size within five days after birth. She was advised to undergo a major surgery on April 3. The baby could not lie on her back as the tumour was located exactly on the spine. It was very aggressive-looking and vascular.” 

Dr Sivasankar Jayakumar, paediatric surgeon at the facility, added that pre-operative workup involving MRI and blood tests, including tumour markers, were carried out to study the case thoroughly. 

“The tumour is most likely to be a teratoma or a rhabdomyosarcoma which was eroding the vertebrae of the spine. The case was extremely rare and the reasons were unknown. Since she was just a few days old, we had to be extremely careful to prevent blood loss. The surgery lasted for seven hours and the help of a plastic surgeon was needed to rectify the huge mark after the medical intervention,” he added.