Despite all odds and challenges they had to face almost every day since his birth, 14 year old Mohammed Arshad Sheikh's parents never gave up hope. Born with a rare congenital heart defect (with only about 30% of his left ventricle functioning and both arteries arising from the right ventricle) and surviving with a blue baby syndrome, Arshad is now doing fine after undergoing strenuous surgery at the Manipal Hospital.
Arshad's case was very complicated and out of surgical limits. No surgeon wanted to touch the boy’s heart for fear of making the situation worse. The parents were so persistent that after much deliberation, we decided to take up the case, said Dr Devananda N.S HOD and consultant, cardiothoracic and vascular surgeon, Manipal Heart Institute. Describing Arshad's case he said, "Both his arteries rise from the right ventricle. In a regular normal heart, the pulmonary artery which carries impure blood to the lungs, arises from the right ventricle, while the aorta, which carries pure blood to all parts of the body, arises from the left."
“During surgery, the failing left ventricle was switched to low pressure lung circulation and the trained right ventricle was made to take the load of the entire body circulation (the reverse of what happens in a regular person). In addition, load on the sick left ventricle was reduced even further by diverting one third of the impure blood directly to the lungs," he added. An elated Mohammad Sheikh, Arshad’s father says, “For the past fourteen years, it wasn’t easy to watch my son get bluer day by day. After countless appointments with top cardiac surgeons in the country, finally a hospital in Chennai agreed to operate on Arshad. He was four years old then. But within four months, his condition deteriorated and he was constantly breathless.”
“We consulted almost every renowned cardiac surgeon in the country. They asked us to wait and watch for some time. Finally we came to Manipal Hospital and the surgery was done successfully,” he added. Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, Dr. Devananda said, “This is a unique case and it took us almost 8 hours to complete the entire surgical procedure.”