Lviv surgeons operate on a child who had been unable to eat for six years due to a burned esophagus
Kyiv • UNN
Surgeons at the St. Nicholas Children's Hospital of Lviv's First Medical Unit performed a rare surgical intervention to help an 8-year-old girl who had been unable to eat for six years due to a burned esophagus.
In Lviv, a child who had been unable to eat for six years due to an esophagus burned by detergent was operated on. Surgeons replaced the damaged organ with a fragment of her own colon. This was reported by the First Medical Association of Lviv, according to UNN.
Details
Diana, an 8-year-old from Ternopil, started having esophageal problems when she was 11 months old. Then the girl came across a bottle of dishwashing liquid and took a few sips. Diana's mother immediately called an ambulance.
The mother immediately called an ambulance. At the hospital, the child's gastrointestinal tract was lavaged and it was found that the liquid had burned the mucous membrane of the esophagus.
For almost a month, the girl was treated for the consequences of the burn. It seemed to be over. However, later problems began: excessive salivation and difficulty swallowing food.
The doctors began to check what was wrong with the endoscopy. However, the thin tube of the endoscope could not enter the child's esophagus. A few days after the unsuccessful examination, Diana could not even swallow water.
Soon after, doctors diagnosed the boy with post-burn scarring stenosis of the esophagus. This means that the detergent had burned not only the mucous membrane, but also the organ itself. Due to its alkaline composition, the liquid leaked into the esophageal tissue. As a result, over time, the muscles turned into a scar, which constricted the esophagus and food could no longer pass through it.
For years, Diana was constantly coming to the hospital for bougie. This is a procedure during which a special balloon is injected under anesthesia to dilate the esophagus under pressure. However, over time, it ceased to be effective. The procedure had to be performed more and more often, and the child could only eat liquid food.
The girl's mother turned to the specialists at St. Nicholas Hospital. They examined Diana and offered the family the only possible way out - radical surgery.
At the time of the surgery, the child's esophagus diameter had narrowed to a critical size of 1 mm. The norm is 1.5 cm. A delay in the operation could have led to the fact that the child would not be able to eat liquid food, or even drink.
Diana underwent plastic surgery of the esophagus. The esophagus was replaced with a part of her own large intestine.
We took a 26-cm-long fragment, transposed it behind the sternum, and sewed it to the throat from above and to the stomach from below. That is, now food enters Diana's stomach through the transplanted part of the intestine, which now serves as an esophagus,
The surgery lasted 4.5 hours. Now Diana is recovering and is gradually starting to eat solid food. She has already tried meat and dreams of eating pizza.
