MGM Healthcare, a multi-specialty quaternary care hospital in the heart of Chennai, successfully performed a complex brain surgery on a new born, saving the day-old child with a huge blood clot in the brain. Dr. L.S. Harishchandra, Consultant Neuro Surgeon, Specialist in Pediatric, Epilepsy and Movement Disorder Surgery at MGM Healthcare, with support from Neonatal Intensive care unit headed by Dr Binu Ninan, performed the timely intricate two-step surgical procedure on the brain of the newborn to remove the blood clot and rescue the child.

A day-old infant was brought to MGM Healthcare’s Neonatal Intensive care unit from an outside hospital with drowsiness and was refusing any feed from the mother. After in-depth examination and an MRI, it was identified that the child had a huge blood clot compressing the brain stem and obstructing the normal flow of fluid in the brain.

Vital functions like breathing, heartbeat, and maintaining a conscious state are controlled by the brain stem. When this part of the brain is compressed, it affects all these functions. The immediate solution for this is to remove the clot.

Speaking about the complexities in the surgery, Dr. Harishchandra said, “Performing any surgery on newborns is loaded with challenges. It’s a tightrope walk between being meticulous and also being as quick as possible. The surgery took about 5 hours. The baby was under the excellent care of our Neonatal team during her post-operative period. Timely intervention and meticulous neonatal post op care was key in saving the life of the child. It’s been few months since we performed this procedure. The baby is doing fine and is keeping up her developmental milestones.

There have been hardly around 100 such newborn cases reported worldwide. With very strong support from our Neonatal intensive care unit, and advanced infrastructure, we at MGM Healthcare are able to perform such complex surgeries. “