What Is an Oesophageal Stent and Why Might A Person Need One?
Introduction A stent is a folded-up hollow tube that is used to keep a blocked area open inside the body. According to doctors in a leading super-specialty hospital in Darbhanga in Bihar, stents are used in various medicinal disciplines like cardiac surgery, but the stents used in gastroenterology (the medical discipline dealing with all sorts of gastric problem treatment) are used usually to help a person swallow solids and liquids when their oesophagus has been blocked due to some health conditions or diseases.
The Procedure The procedure of implanting an oesophageal stent takes place under the influence of general anaesthesia or conscious sedation. If and when it takes place under the influence of general anaesthesia, the patient sleeps through the procedure. When it takes place under conscious sedation, the patient will feel no pain as the area being operated is numbed and the patient will be relaxed during the procedure.
The surgeon will then place a catheter (a long thin tube) into the patient’s mouth and thread it to the oesophagus. Then a surgeon places a stent over the catheter and thread it to the correct position in the oesophagus across the blockage. The stent is then expanded against the walls of the oesophagus and fixed in that position, relieving the blockage. The stent is left in placer and the catheter is removed. Why Might A Person Need An Oesophageal Stent? An oesophageal stent may be needed for a number of reasons. The most common health condition that causes blockage in the oesophagus is oesophageal cancer among others for the purposes of oral cancer treatment. Oesophageal blockage is often a symptom of mouth cancer. There are various cancer hospitals in India where an oesophageal stent is used as one of the primary procedures to relieve blockage. Stents are also used in the treatment of other conditions such as:
Cancer of the top part of the stomach Narrowing of the esophagus from an ulcer Narrowing of the esophagus from radiation treatment Abnormal opening between the trachea and esophagus Hole in the esophagus
The hospital in Darbhanga mentioned above is one of the best hospital for gastroenterology, not only for the areas of Bihar and Jharkhand, which are close, but the whole of North India.