PANAJI: The phrase, ‘a heart of stone’ may no longer be just an idiom. In a rare case, a doctor at the Goa Medical College (GMC) and hospital, Bambolim, found that a dead 50-year-old man’s heart tissues had calcified, virtually turning the vital organ into a stone.
Dr Bharat Sreekumar, a junior resident-cum-second year PG student doctor at the GMC’s department of forensic medicine, had in July conducted an autopsy on the body of the unidentified man who was found dead in a South Goa park. While dissecting the heart, he found thatit was stony as the left ventricle showed massive endocardial calcification that caused restrictive cardiomyopathy — a condition wherein the complete filling of ventricles with blood is compromised.
“The heart was so hard as if it were set in a stone. I showed this rare finding to my seniors in the department who suggested that I do a histopathological study on this portion of heart with the help of the GMC’s pathology department,” Sreekumar said.
Histopathology involves the microscopic examination of tissue in a bid to study the manifestations of a disease.
The examination confirmed that the man’s heart had hardened due to calcification — a condition that also causes kidney stones — and not due to fibrosis of the heart’s tissue.
Heart-hardening due endomyocardial fibrosis (scarring of heart tissue) is a common medical problem in India.
In such cases calcification occurs together with fibrosis.
“However, in the case I dealt with, there was massive calcification with minimal fibrosis, a condition that is rarely documented in medical literature. This is why I thought I should present it at the national conference of the India Academy of Forensic Medicine. The etiology and pathophysiology causing this are not really understood and still remain a mystery,” Sreekumar said.
A forensic scientific case study paper titled, ‘A Heart Set in Stone’, bagged first prize at the recently concluded conference’s 42nd edition held at SCB Medical College, in Cuttack, Odisha.
“At last year’s edition of the same conference in Hyderabad, Sreekumar had won second prize for his poster presentation of a scientific paper on drowning. At that time, I had told him that we should aim for the first place in the following year, as the prize is instituted in honour of former professor and head of our department, Dr Jagmohan Sharma,” Dr Madhu Ghodkirekar, associate professor of forensic medicine at the GMC, said.