– As country hosts Caribbean College of Surgeons

FOUR Guyanese surgeons have benefitted from training in a new sutureless technique used when conducting a thyroidectomy, and it is expected that local patient care will be improved through the use of this procedure.

The technique learnt is known as a sutureless thyroidectomy, and local surgeons were trained in this at the conference of the Caribbean College of Surgeons held in Guyana from June 20 to 22.

Head of the Local Organising Committee, Dr. Shilindra Rajkumar, noted that this conference is one which is held in a different Caribbean territory each year, and said: “We do workshops within each territory to teach the locals something new.”

This year, the College of Surgeons hosted a one-day workshop, on June 19, for local surgeons where the thyroidectomy technique was taught. A thyroidectomy is an operation that involves the surgical removal of all or part of the thyroid gland, found in the neck.

“That workshop was the first of its kind where they actually removed thyroid glands, in persons who had diseased thyroid glands, with a sutureless technique,” Dr. Rajkumar said.

Instead of applying sutures, which is stitch or row of stitches holding together the edges of a wound or surgical incision, the surgeons learned how to seal the incision by using a ligasure, which is a device that works by applying a precise amount of bipolar energy and pressure to fuse the collagen and elastin in the vessel walls.

Explaining the workshop, Dr. Rajkumar said that the thyroidectomy was done for four patients. The first surgery was done by a visiting faculty, assisted by a local faculty of four surgeons. The three subsequent surgeries were, however, conducted by the local faculty, while the visiting faculty of surgeons only observed the procedures.

Dr. Rajkumar highlighted that procedures were conducted without any complications, and this technique will be to the benefit of the entire department of surgery at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC).

General and Thoracic Surgeon, Dr. Cheetanand Mahadeo, was the key local surgeon that performed the thyroidectomies. And responding to questions from the Guyana Chronicle at the sidelines of the conference, he noted that this technique will be used in future thyroidectomy procedures as long as the equipment is made available.

“We were fortunate enough that we could actually have this piece of device (the ligasure) available,” Dr. Mahadeo related, adding that the reason this specific sutureless technique was not used before was because the device could not have been afforded.

However, he clarified that this is not a new technique worldwide; it is the “first of its kind” in Guyana.

With this technique, he explained that the operating time for the procedure would be reduced by at least a third of the time, while providing the same outcome. With this, he said that the patients would spend less time asleep, recover faster and would be able to go home sooner.

“The cost of the comsumables and the cost of the machine will be offset by shorter sleeping times and better outcomes,” he said, adding: “So overall, in terms of patient safety and getting better, it is going to benefit us regardless of the cost [and] we get back the money there.”

Also speaking to members of the media at the conference was Vice- President of the Caribbean College of Surgeons, Professor Shamir Cawich.

He highlighted that the Caribbean College of Surgeons is a large group of surgeons- about 250 doctors overall- from every Caribbean country. And the conference is a forum for these surgeons to meet, learn from each other and share resources with the aim of improving the “healthcare package” across the Caribbean.

“The concept of the conferences and what the college brings to each territory that it goes to each year is that of fellowship of surgeons across a region. In doing so, ideas are shared, technologies are discussed and goals are set,” Cawich said.

At the conference too, on Friday night, 17 new fellows were inducted into the Caribbean College; four of these fellows were Guyanese local practitioners. These four are: Dr. Mahadeo, Dr. Rajkumar, Dr. Tameshwar Algu and Dr. Navindranauth Rambarran.

“To be a fellow of the Caribbean College of Fellows, you have to have a certain degree of competency, reliability and integrity,” Dr. Rajkumar explained.