Lviv robotic surgeon saved a 6-year-old girl with a rare syndrome

A rare syndrome diagnosed in 1 patient out of 1 000, found in a 6-year-old girl from Khmelnytskyi. She could not eat and lost more than 20% of her weight in a few weeks.

Six-year-old Polina Bidyuk from Starokostyantynov, in the Khmelnytsky region, was diagnosed with complex intestinal obstruction — Wilka's syndrome. She was urgently sent to Lviv, where the girl was successfully operated on by the Da Vinci Si robot surgeon at the St. Nicholas Children's Hospital of the First Medical Association of Lviv, reported on the hospital's Facebook page.

When Polina started vomiting one evening right after dinner, her parents called an ambulance, doctors say. Appendicitis was initially suspected in the district hospital, but after an examination, he was referred to the Khmelnytskyi Regional Hospital. There, specialists diagnosed the child with Wilkie's syndrome — complex intestinal obstruction, which is found in 1 patient out of 1,000. Polina was urgently referred to the Lviv St. Nicholas Hospital.

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“The essence of this syndrome is that the superior mesenteric artery is one of the largest vessels in the body – squeezes the duodenum, through which the food we consume usually passes”, — explained Oleksandr Kalinchuk, surgeon and medical director of St. Nicholas Children's Hospital.

Conservative medical treatment did not help, the girl vomited after every meal and lost weight from 18 kilograms to 14 in a few weeks, the doctors said.

Urgent surgery was required. The duodenum is located in a dangerous zone, where the stomach connects with the small intestine, and the pancreas, liver vessels, and bile ducts converge around it. Intervening in this zone is extremely dangerous, extreme precision is required — therefore, they decided to use the Da Vinci Si robotic surgeon, which is at the disposal of the hospital.

“During a two-hour operation, doctors “shortened” the path of food to the small intestine by bypassing the compression site. They took the free loop of the intestine and connected and although it is still squeezed by the mesenteric artery and the aorta, the food now enters the small intestine unhindered, so to speak, by a bypass.” explained at the hospital.

According to the doctors, now Polina is successfully recovering from the operation, is eating well and is gaining back the lost weight.