Source: www.thefreelibrary.com
Author: staff

His lifelong mission has been to save trees. He used to spend a lot of time delivering lectures, shouting slogans and transplanting trees. But three months ago, all this came to an abrupt end as Dr Nitin Pandey was diagnosed with tongue cancer of the second stage. A paediatrician by profession, he could hardly speak and doctors at the Capital’s Max hospital had no option except chopping off half his tongue carrying the deadly cancer cells

But thanks to reconstructive plastic surgery, Pandey has now got not only a new tongue but also his voice back. Today he is back doing what he loves best — creating awareness about our vegetation at his hometown in Dehradun.

But all this would have been impossible had not the doctors at the hospital made a timely intervention.

“Generally people chewing tobacco and tobacco products suffer from tongue cancer. But Pandey was unfortunate that he caught the disease without using tobacco. We had to perform a surgery to remove his left half of the tongue,” said Dr Vedant Kabra, consultant surgical oncologist at the hospital.

After half his tongue was removed, Pandey could neither speak nor drink or eat. Hence, a reconstruction became necessary. Doctors carried out a complex 10- hour surgery to help Pandey speak again.

“We took tissue from his forearm and reconstructed his tongue. The arm has two arteries and it can do with one only. So we took an artery from the forearm along with a vein and reconstructed his tongue with that tissue,” said Dr Sunil Choudhary, director of the department of aesthetic and reconstructive plastic surgery at Max hospital. Thereafter, a micro- surgery was also carried out to join the tissue to the remaining part of the tongue.

“We connected the artery of the tongue to the artery and vein of the neck. The stitches used to join the two parts were of 50 microns, which is half the diameter of human hair. Eight to nine stitches were used to join the tongue,” said Choudhary, who was assisted by plastic surgeons Dr Raghav Mantri and Dr Prateek Arora.

“He has been an inspiration for all of us. Few patients have such strength to cope with severe illness. He has great will power and has responded well to the treatment. He will be under observation for five years,” said Choudhary.

Post-surgery, Pandey and his group are again raising the pitch to save trees.

“We enlighten the public and the government about the dangers of excessive tree felling and try to stop people from cutting trees. We are currently in the midst of our antiplastic carry- bag campaign.
We are talking to the shopkeepers in different localities and requesting them to use cloth bags,” said Pandey, who runs a clinic in Dehradun.

And one day he also hopes to build a hospital.

“My dream is to have enough money to build a small hospital in the interior of the Garhwal Himalayas and spread happiness among the people.”