"DECARBONISING” A MAN’S HEART.

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 364, 19 February 1937, Page 8

"DECARBONISING” A MAN’S HEART.

•CRAPED WHILE IT WAS BEATING. AMAZING OPERATION IN LONDON HOSPITAL. Doctors at the Royal Cheet Hospital, City Road, London, have successfully performed a marvel of modern surgery by cutting open a man’s chest and scraping his heart while It was •till beating. The 28-year-old -patient’s home Is at Kettering, Northants, and he came to London specially for the operation.

He Is now living beneath an oxygen tent fitted on to his bed at the hospital, and his condition Is stated to be “comfortable and cheerful.” The operation was necessary because the man was suffering from what is known as calcified covering of the heart.

Dense ehalk-llke plaques brought about by previous chronic inflammation had prevented the heart from acting properly by constricting the great veins.

it was decided that the heart should oe scraped In order to remove the layers of chalky deposit—the human equivalent of decarbonising a motorear engine. Very few similar operations have seen attempted before In England or America. Its delicacy and seriousness ire obvious.

Blood Donor Ready.

First the surgeons cut a great opening in the man’s chest. Then they scraped the patient’s heart, and sewed ihe chest up.

Throughout this extremely delicate aperation one of the hospital's blood lonors stood by ready for transfusion, If necessary, but so skilful was the work of the surgeons that his services were not required.

For the next few days the patient must live in an atmosphere containing 70 per cent, of oxygen instead of the 10 per cent, found in normal air. For this purpose a special tent with celluloid windows, in shape not unlike :he covering of a small saloon motorcar, has been fitted over his bed.

Oxygen Is supplied by a special machine which is in common use in the United States, though there are comparatively few in English hospitals. Four large cylinders of oxygen are used every 24 hours. Fnr perhaps a week the pa-tient will remain Under his oxygen tent. Then he will be able to breathe the normal atmosphere. The physicians and surgeons who have been responsible for this extraordinary operation decline io allow their names to be published. They are hoping that the patient, completely fit, will be abie to leave the hospital In a month or six weeks.