Glue used to fix patient's bleeding blood vessel

Bhim Singh

New Delhi: A 60-year-old patient suffering from massive hemoptysis underwent a rare treatment process in which his blood vessel was fixed with a glue to stop the flow of blood, hospital authorities said on Wednesday.

Bhim Singh was brought to the emergency ward of north Delhi-based Saroj Super Specialty Hospital on the intervening night of February 17 and 18 with massive hemoptysis.

Patient Bhim Singh after the surgery. Pic/IANS

Hemoptysis is a condition marked by spitting up blood or blood-tinged sputum from the respiratory tract.

Hemoptysis occurs when tiny blood vessels that line the lung airways are broken. In the case of Singh, the doctors said he had lost a lot of blood and his condition could have aggravated.

"Initially bronchoscopy was performed on the patient but we could not see anything in air ways. After great efforts we localized the bleeding segments of the lung which was coming from right bronchial tree. I placed the bronchoscope glue (Quick fix and Butylcynoacrylate) to seal the bleeding vessel," said Rakes K. Chawla, sr. consultant, respiratory medicine, critical care and sleep disorder.

Chawla, who has treated a number of other cases related to hemoptysis said the bleeding stopped with the help of glue.

"We left the endo-tracheal tube to keep the airway and avoid any choking of airways. Yesterday we checked through bronchoscopy, everything was in order and we extubated the patient," Chawla said.

He said that the only reason this treatment was unique was because active hemoptysis has been controlled with glue under local anaesthesia without any surgical intervention but simply with bronchoscopy.

"The patient is in neuro-ICU at present. His condition is regularly being monitored for the cause of hemoptysis with X-ray, chest and other investigations. The patient is comfortable," he added.

The patient can be discharged from the hospital after one month .