A young man from Pakistan, who had oral cancer, came to the city where he had his jaw reconstructed at a private hospital. Muhammad Shakeel Khan, who is into upholstery business in the Karachi province, suffered from sqaumous cell carcinoma three years ago.
At that point, the cancer was at an initial stage, and Shakeel came to Chennai to Balaji Dental and Cranofacial Hospital for treatment. “Half of his jaw was removed along with the lymph nodes and the inner soft tissue defect was closed with skin,” said S.M. Balaji, director of the hospital. Shakeel then went back to his country, where he underwent radiotherapy and then became free of the disease. However, his jaw was not reconstructed, leaving his face totally disfigured. It had affected his quality of life, his ability to swallow and speak, Dr. Balaji said.
Around two weeks ago, Shakeel came back to Chennai for the reconstruction of his jaw. “We first did a PET scan and established that he was free of the disease. We then did the reconstruction by harvesting multiple rib grafts to create his jaw bone along with titanium plates, and in order to avoid friction of the bone and the reconstructed plates with the base of the skull, we used rib cartilage (costochondral junction) to reconstruct the mandibular joint.
The surgery was successful and Mr. Shakeel is due to leave on Monday, Dr. Balaji said.
The surgery was done by harvesting multiple rib grafts to create his jaw bone
