Iraqi woman successfully undergoes bronchial thermoplasty in Coimbatore hospital

COIMBATORE: Rukhaiya Majeed, 51, a resident of Babel in Iraq, has been an asthmatic since birth and her condition worsened for the past two decades. Rukhaiya, a homemaker, would avoid climbing stairs, cooking more than necessities or playing with her grandchildren at home.
She was constantly living in fear of an asthma attack till her first session of bronchial thermoplasty in Coimbatore-based Royal Care Super Speciality Hospital.
“If she climbed a flight of stairs or ran behind her grandchildren for a while, she would end up gasping for breath and become breathless. She needed to go to the hospital almost monthly once for an emergency nebulisation and would require admission at least thrice a year,” lung specialist at Royal Care Hospital Dr V R Pattabhiraman said.
“I was unable to do anything at home feeling like an invalid,” she said.
It was around three to four months back that an Iraq-based lung interventional specialist referred her to Royal Care Super Speciality Hospital and recommended a bronchial thermoplasty.
“Bronchial thermoplasty is a method of using radio frequency to help open people’s airways by reducing the amount of thickened smooth muscle in the insides of their airways,” Dr V R Pattabiraman said. “The doctor in Iraq had undergone a training with us last year for a month on interventional pulmonology,” he added. The doctor was one among the 15 doctors from abroad and 250 doctors from within the country to be trained in the hospital for advanced pulmonology through intervention.
Rukhaiya said she found a vast difference after her first session of thermoplasty. “I found myself more energetic, less breathless and actually climbed my first flight of steps. After my second session, I could travel between Coimbatore and Bengaluru and could go out in Bengaluru without issues,” Rukhaiya said, who is all set to take her flight out of the city on Tuesday.
“Now I feel perfectly fine. I was asked to try walking faster, climb stairs and I have not had any issues,” she said. “It is like life has suddenly opened up for me,” she said.