The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Gamma Knife: brain surgery without pain

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 11, 2007
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Gamma Knife: brain surgery without pain

Staff Reporter

This technology tackles problem with high-energy radiation

HYDERABAD: Gamma Knife, a non-invasive tool offers an option of brain surgery without knife targeting diseased tissues with precision radiation, Dheerendra Prasad, chairman, Gamma Knife Unit of the New York-based Rosewell Park Cancer Institute claimed here on Tuesday. Speaking to presspersons, Dr. Prasad said while surgery comes with pain, blood and a long recuperation period, the Gamma Knife technology does away with all these and ensures that a patient returns home and work at the earliest. The Gamma Knife and similar other radio-surgical technologies offer treatment of brain disorders ranging from tumours, vascular malformations to facial pain.Being non-invasive, it does not entail opening up skull for a surgery and tackles the problem with a high-energy radiation. The lesion gradually shrinks with time and gets cured. While all cases referred to surgery cannot be handled by the procedure, the suitable ones come out with a high success rate and with comparatively little risk or side effects.

The procedure was already available with medical institutions in Mumbai, New Delhi and Bangalore while a similar facility would soon come up in Chandigarh.A.K. Purohit, a professor and head of NIMS neurosurgery department, said a proposal for Gamma Knife facility was made in the institute upgradation plan. Every year, 2,000 brain surgeries were performed at the NIMS.

The Gamma Knife facility would cost around Rs. 20 crores .

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