A team of doctors from Apollo hospital, New Delhi have successfully treated a middle-aged Tanzanian police officer who was suffering from a blood clot condition.

The 42-year old woman weighed 123 kilograms and was suffering from deep vein thrombosis, a clot in the heart and pulmonary embolism. She had a big ball-like clot in her heart which was bobbling in the ventricle almost at the verge of blocking the pulmonary artery (the main artery which goes from heart to the lung) and lungs were studded with blood clots. 

Considering her critical condition and very poor chances of survival, surgeons turned her down for surgery as there was a very high risk for open heart surgery. When the woman was admitted at the Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, she had severe breathlessness and was in cardiogenic shock and had very low oxygen concentration in the blood. 

"Post investigation we found that she had large blood clots in both legs, a big clot in the right ventricle and both lungs. Considering the criticality of her situation, surgeons refused to operate on her as the mortality rate is high during surgery," N.N. Khanna, Senior Consultant (Interventional Cardiologist and Endovascular Specialist) at the hospital, said in a statement.

The clot in the heart was of the size of a table tennis ball and if it had moved towards the pulmonary artery it would have blocked the outflow of the heart like a ball valve suddenly and completely and she would have died in less than a minute, the doctor said. Khanna said her "femoral vein was first punctured for preventing the movement of clots from legs to heart and lungs". 

"Later, clot-busting drug called Tissue Plasminogen Activator (TPA) was given by catheters placed directly on the clots to open the blocked lung arteries and to carefully dissolve the clot in the heart under supervision. "The procedure continued for 96 hours with continuous monitoring of the status of lysis of the clots by imaging and measuring serum fibrinogen levels of the blood to avoid the risk of major bleeding. Eventually, the clots in the heart and lungs got dissolved."

Despite being a critical procedure, the patient was not given even a single incision and the entire procedure was through a key hole endovascular technique and post procedure, she recovered in less than 24 hours. "She is doing fine now and requires no further treatment except for oral medicines," Khanna said.