CHENNAI: Doctors at Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children, Egmore (ICH), performed a rare surgery by which they removed a massive tumour from the lower jaw of Ebenezer, a seven-year-old boy from Tiruvottiyur, Chennai. The non-cancerous tumour measuring 12 * 10 cm in size and weighing about 1.5 kilograms was removed in an operation spanning eight hours and the boy’s jaw was reconstructed using titanium plate. “Bone reconstruction surgery will be performed once the patient is old enough”, said Dr.Arun Kumar, ICH, who was part of the team of doctors who performed the surgery.
Interesting, the boy’s grandmother, mother and aunt too suffered from a similar condition. “Considering his family’s history with the condition (Familial gigantiform cementoma), this can be treated as a case of a genetic disorder.”, says Dr.Arun Kumar. The boy had earlier lost his grandmother to the disease. “Ebenezer’s tumour kept growing in size for the past one year and he developed difficulty eating and talking. However, the family had apprehensions regarding surgery and were reluctant to seek medical assistance. Had the family taken medical help earlier, we could have saved his jaw. The lack of awareness can be blamed for this”, he added.
Ebenezer’s tumour is one of the rarest forms of tumour worldwide. Till date, there are only 55 such reported cases worldwide, out of which 13 cases were from Asia. This is the first-ever case to be documented in India.
The surgery was performed by a team of doctors comprising Oral and maxillofacial surgery department HOD Prof. Dr.C. Prasad, Balaji, Prof Dr Arun Kumar, Asst Prof Dr Arulmozhi, general surgeon Dr Priya, an anaesthetic team under Prof Dr Krishnan, a pediatric surgery team under Dr Muthu Kumar along with doctors from the ENT department of the hospital.
The boy is now doing well and has started taking normal food, doctors informed.
They also added that he will be discharged from the hospital in a couple of days.
The surgery was performed free of cost under the chief minister’s comprehensive health insurance scheme.
