Doctors in India have performed a historic surgery on a man who had a cancer tumour almost his body size.
Gumreet Singh
A student had a tumour that weighed almost nine stone - nearly double his body weight - removed from his thigh in a risky operation. Seven years ago, Gumreet Singh, of Jalandhar, in Punjab, northern India, noticed a lump growing on his right leg.
The growth got so big the 26-year-old could no longer fit into clothes and eventually it became so heavy he could no longer walk and had to give up his studies.
He was diagnosed with cancer and begged doctors to remove it, but none would operate on the huge mass.
The young man who has been fighting cancer for seven years said: “I’ve not been able to move my leg for the last four years. My leg just continued to swell and in the end it didn’t fit into any clothes properly. I couldn’t stand or sit, I could only lie on my back on my bed unable to roll over or change sides.”
Dr. Duratosh Pandey who led other doctors in performing the historic surgery has this to say: “The tumour was extremely big and it had lodged in his pelvic bone and thigh. When we weighed it after surgery we found it surpassed his body weight 1.5 times. But to remove it completely we had to amputate his right leg and pelvic bone.”
Although he is not certain if all the cancer has been removed, but he is optimistic that Gumreet will now have radiotherapy and chemotherapy to ensure full recovery.