Valve from cow's heart saves life of 81-year-old woman from Hyderabad

Zee Media Bureau/Salome Phelamei

Chennai: In a medical breakthrough, Indian doctors successfully implanted a valve made from a cow's heart inside a leaking heart valve of an 81-year-old woman here.

The path-breaking surgery, which lasted over a period of three hours, was performed by a four-member team at the Frontier Lifeline Hospitals in Chennai last Saturday.

According to doctors, the patient from Hyderabad had already undergone a valve replacement surgery 11 years ago. However, the original valve had narrowed over time and earlier this year, she developed the symptoms of heart failure.

After carefully examining her condition, doctors at Frontier Lifeline Hospital performed the opeartion when it removed the diseased valve and replaced it with a new bioprosthetic heart valve.

The procedure was not easy as the elderly woman had also undergone treatment for breast cancer a few years ago.

“She had undergone radiotherapy and this had caused tissue in her chest to get stuck. This made her an extremely high risk case,” an English daily quoted Dr Anantharaman, the senior consultant cardiologist and who carried out the surgery, as saying.

The patient, who is recovering from the procedure, has been shifted to the general ward.