A 63-year-old Bhutanese, who was suffering from breathlessness and coughing blood for two years, was diagnosed with a rare tumour in the trachea and successfully operated upon at a city hospital recently.

Dago Dorji could not remember when he had last breathed freely, slept well or spent a whole minute without coughing. But that changed with the five hour-plus tracheal resection and reconstruction surgery on September 15.

“He had haemangioma or a tumour originating from blood vessels, which was bleeding inside his windpipe,” said Gautam Mukhopadhyay, the head of surgical oncology at Ruby General Hospital who operated on Dago.

Anaesthetist Tushar Kanti Ghosh had a key role to play because the endotracheal tube (through which anaesthetics are given) had to be inserted into a windpipe 80 per cent of which was blocked by the tumour, added Mukhopadhyay. The third member of the team was cardio-thoracic surgeon Mrinal Bandhu Das.

Two days before the surgery, a hole was made in the windpipe, below the tumour, for unobstructed breathing (tracheostomy).

“We had to remove six rings of the trachea to get rid of the tumour and then the trachea was mobilised and reconstructed (joined),” added Mukherjee.

A post-operative virtual bronchoscopy revealed normal airway passage in the trachea with no obstructions.

Dago’s son Passang said his father was admitted to Jingme Dorji Wanchuck National Referral Hospital in Thimphu, Bhutan, before being shifted to Ruby General Hospital.