Lung cancer weakens food pipe, complex procedure saves woman

NAGPUR: A 50-year-old woman patient of lung cancer won the battle against the deadly disease, but the aftermath of treatment created a life-threatening situation for her. Doctors at Wockhardt Hospital saved her by performing a complex endoscopic procedure.
During her cancer treatment, the woman had went through radiotherapy which narrowed her esophagus (food pipe). She developed difficulty in swallowing food. To relieve this, doctors placed a metallic stent in her food pipe across narrowing outside.

But this resulted in another problem. As the food pipe had weakened due to radiotherapy, it developed fistula – an abnormal connection between food pipe and wind pipe. Whatever she ate or drank would enter her wind pipe (trachea). She would cough relentlessly and, gradually, the respiratory tract got infected too.
When she was presented to Dr Piyush Marudwar, consultant gastroenterologist and advanced endoscopist, he conducted a Gastrograffin study, a diagnostic examination of the gastrointestinal tract.
“As there was a connection between her food pipe and wind pipe, the only solution was to close that hole. For this, we decided to use a fully-covered self expandable metal stent. But the covered stents have risk of slipping downwards into stomach while swallowing food. So, it was another challenge for us,” said Dr Marudwar.
Doctors decided to use clips to fix the stent so that it doesn’t slip down. “The stent was fixed using a newer method called stent fix clip. This kind of procedure was done for only the second time in Central India,” said Dr Marudwar.
The process was eventually successful as the patient started consuming even solid food within 24 hours.