Welcome Rohan: Four-month-old from Pakistan arrives in India for treatment

Doctors, who will treat the infant, said his heart condition needs immediate attention and are positive about outcome of surgery

India will be home for four-month-old Rohan from Pakistan till he undergoes treatment. The infant from Lahore, who suffers from a congenital heart condition, reached India today and will be treated at Noida’s Jaypee Hospital.

Rohan and his family’s visit to India assume significance after he was granted medical visa on priority following the intervention of external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj. She responded to a tweet from the boy’s hapless father, Kanwal Sadiq, even as the relations between the two nations continued to remain strained.

Rohan will be under the supervision of paediatric cardiologist Dr Ashutosh Marwah and paediatric cardiac surgeon Dr Rajesh Sharma, at Jaypee Hospital. While Dr Marwah will carry out various investigations, Dr Sharma will perform the surgery.


Rohan, with his parents

Speaking to My Medical Mantra, Dr Marwah said, “One in every 100 children is affected with heart ailments. Rohan has a hole in his heart. He is suffering from D-Transposition of great arteries; the blood pathway is impaired because the two arteries are connecting to the wrong chambers of the heart and blood without oxygen flows in the body.”

He added, “This condition requires immediate medical attention as after eight months of the birth, it cannot be treated.”

Sharing the treatment details, Dr Sharma said, “We have a special plan to treat Rohan. We will conduct a procedure called Arterial Switch with VSD Closure, wherein the aorta and pulmonary arteries will be shifted to their right places. If the surgery is done within the four months from birth, the chance of patient surviving is 100%.”

“We conduct 50 operations of this surgery every year, and the success rate is 100%,” he added.

“Rohan was not well right from his birth. We got the tests done, and came to know about the condition. In Pakistan, we have limited facilities and could not have done the operation there. That’s why we chose a hospital in India,” said Sadiq.

Rohan is among thousand patients who have been welcomed in India for treatment. India has always been a friend to the ailing from Pakistan, and even as political animosity grows between the two countries, India has shown it to give a healing touch to the patients from across the border.