Rashid Hospital Doctors remove 4 kg tumor from patient's kidney in rare surgery.

Dubai, United Arab Emirates, February 7, 2017:  In a rare and complex surgery, a team of doctors from Rashid Hospital successfully removed a kidney tumour weighing a staggering 4kg while saving the organ.

The doctors who performed the two and half-hour surgery on a 62-year-old Arab expatriate , managed to salvage the kidney and save the patient, who previously visited three hospitals that refused to perform the high-risk surgery.

The surgery was performed by Dr Faisal Badri, Consultant and Head of General Surgery at Rashid Hospital with the assistance of Dr. Alya Al Mazrouei surgeon and CEO of Rashid Hospital. 

Dr Badri, said: “A kidney normally weights 300 grams, can you image a 4 kg tumour protruding out of the right kidney? The tumour was so big that it occupied half the abdomen on the right side; it pushed the kidney into the pelvis and into the liver on the left side. The tumour was attached to the colon and the small bowel. Such surgeries are high-risk because of the high chances of bleeding as the tumour mass is attached the main blood vessels. Therefore, pre-operative planning and absolute precision is essential in such surgeries.”

The patient underwent a battery of tests, CT scans and other radiological reports before the surgeons decided to perform the surgery. All the tests were performed in the Hospital’s newly opened state-of-the-art Oncosurgical GI clinic.

Dr Badri said: “The operation took two and half hours and the first step was to secure the vascularity to ensure there is absolutely no blood supply to the tumour. We managed to get the mass out while keeping the organs intact but we needed to remove a part of the muscle that separates the chest from the abdomen as it was attached to the mass. When we removed a part of this muscle, the lung was exposed and we fitted a pipe to help the lung expand normally. After four days, when the lung function was back to normal, we removed the pipe.”

The patient is currently stable and will be discharged shortly.

We have sent the mass to the laboratory for further investigation to determine to exact type of cancer so that oncological treatment can effectively take place.