Swarnaprabha Bhattacharya on her hospital bed after the surgery

Doctors in Calcutta removed a malignant tumour from the breast of a 100-year-old woman, a surgery medical experts called rare given the patient’s age.

A day after the family members of Swarnaprabha Bhattacharya celebrated her 100th birthday, she started bleeding and was rushed to a private hospital in the city.

“The tumour was detected a few years back but we didn’t want her to undergo surgery because of her age,” said Swarnaprabha’s daughter Eboo Banerjee, a US-based paediatrician who had flown in from Maryland to join her mother’s birthday celebration. “She had become anaemic because of blood loss and doctors said the only option left was to remove the tumour.”

The tumour was taken out on February 19. “The surgery was completed in one-and-a-half hours. Usually, such procedures continue for three-four hours but in this case we had to wrap it up fast because of the patient’s age. Prolonged anaesthesia would have been risky as it might have resulted in her putting on ventilator,” said surgical oncologist Subashis Sarkar, who had led the team that operated on Swarnaprabha at Woodlands Hospital.

The centenarian returned home a few days back and has recovered from the surgery.

“Removing tumour from a 100-year-old is very risky. Longer the surgery, more the risk,” said surgical oncologist Gautam Mukhopadhyay. Surgical gastroenterologist Sanjay De Bakshi said patients older than 85 years are usually not strong enough to withstand surgery.