Surgeons of a government hospital on August 24 removed the cancerous vulva of a woman and reconstructed it in the same sitting, which they claimed to be a first of its kind operation in the country.
 

The 50-year-old patient who was suffering from cancer of vulva, the female external genital, was operated on at the Kalyani JNM Hospital in Nadia district, gynaecologist Dr Mriganka Mouli Saha, who headed the team of doctors, said. The vulva was reconstructed through plastic surgery so that she can lead a normal life, he said.

It took the team of 10 doctors around five hours to complete the entire process using local anaesthesia. "The excision and reconstruction of vulva in the same sitting of oncosurgery are carried out for the first time in India," Saha said. The patient had visited the hospital with gynaecological problems on August 4 and following tests, it was confirmed that she was suffering from vulvar carcinoma, the gynaecologist said.

The operation was successful and the patient will remain under observation for two weeks in hospital, he added. Dr Debasis Baitalik, a plastic surgeon of the state-run Bangur Institute of Neurosciences, Kolkata, was invited to join the team for the operation. As the operation was conducted in a government hospital, the patient's family did not have to bear any cost.