Madhya Pradesh: Nine-year-old sings patriotic songs during brain surgery

BHOPAL: Setting a bar that would give shivers to even adults, a nine-year-old braveheart, lying on an operation table, sang patriotic songs on piano during her brain surgery at Gwalior hospital.
The team of doctors at a private hospital in Gwalior who operated her claimed that she is one of the youngest girls in the country to have undergone the ‘awake craniotomy’ — an advanced neurosurgery in the eloquent cortex of the brain.
Doctors hoped that patient singing during the operation would help to avoid any deficits. Dr Abhishek Chauhan, who operate her, said the 9-year-old girl from Morena had uncontrolled seizures for the past 2 years.
In 2019, CT Brain revealed a tumour just below the hand area of the motor cortex in her brain.
On December 8, Dr Chauhan with his team of experts including the anaesthesiologist Dr Vinod Sengar operated her and removed the tumour completely via awake craniotomy. “She was asked to play piano/keyboard when we were removing the tumour from her brain to look for any slightest glitch in her fine hand movements.
“She did perfectly well during and after the surgery and was discharged in an unhealthy condition two days after the surgery,” said Dr Abhishek Chauhan.
By keeping her awake, the team was able to monitor her ability to cope with and vocalise the key change during the brain tumour surgery. Slightest mishandling of the brain cortex in eloquent areas can cause serious consequences for the patient, doctors say.
“Such surgeries need high levels of competence in anaesthesia and surgical skills as well as cooperation from the patient side,” Dr Chauhan added.
“When the patient is awake we will get to know about even slightest of deficits and we can change the entry point or trajectory till the tumour and this makes the brain surgeries highly safe," he said.
Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has congratulated the doctors.