
Chennai: When Mohamed Sheikh Hassan (36) from Kenyan consulted Gleneagles Global Health City with extensive swelling of right cheek, little did he expect that he would be back to normal.
The doctors who operated him for over 13 hours, removed 2 kg myoepithelial carcinoma tumor, which occurs in the salivary glands in the mouth.
He had history of disfiguring his face and that physically blocked his vision for more than two years. He has been operated thrice in his country but with no solace to his problem. He had a continuous increase in size of swelling on his face which lead to multiple problems like shortness of breath, complexity to eat and speak.
Speaking at a press conference here on Friday, Gleneagles Institute of Oncology director Dr S Rajasundaram said, “On evaluating the patient with PET CT scan, he was found to have extensive bony destruction without any development of secondary malignant growth in distance. Further, the biopsy report revealed that he had myoepithelial carcinoma.”
The patient underwent composite resection, selective neck dissection, reconstruction with bipaddled mircrovascular fibular free flap.
The post operative recovery was said to be good and was planned for further adjuvant radiotherapy post the discussion with multidisciplinary tumor board. Having completed the radiotherapy, Mohamed is back to his regular routine life.
Explaining about the complications and challenges on the surgery Rajasundaram said, “Restoring the vision and reconstruction of nasal passages was the most challenging aspect of this surgery and the success rate of this complex microvascular reconstruction is another important factor to bring back the best quality of life.”

