Priya (name changed) was born with a rare congenital anorectal disorder that causes the urinal passage and the anus to lie next to each other (called vestibular anus).
Priya (name changed), 21, was always told that it was the act of God that caused her medical problems. She was born with a rare congenital anorectal disorder that causes the urinal passage and the anus to lie next to each other (called vestibular anus).
She was operated upon recently in Joy Hospital, Chembur, and can now lead a normal life. She is getting married next year.
“This disorder affects one in 8,000 people and is corrected normally in the first month after birth. Priya’s case is rare as she waited so long. We have not seen older people coming to us with this problem. One cannot live like this,” said Dr Roy Patankar, gastro-intestinal surgeon, who operated upon her. Priya complained of difficulty in passing stools and suffered from urinary tract infection.
Priya’s parents are not very educated and didn’t approach the doctor because of the social stigma attached to it. “Her parents would tell her that its God's curse or that she was intersex. Only because she was getting married that they brought her to the hospital to get ‘plastic surgery’ done,” said Dr Patankar.
The challenge in the case was to separate the rectum canal away from the vaginal and urine passage. Priya was operated in three different stages that panned over six months. “First, the surgery involved diverting the large intestine into a bag placed on the patient’s stomach called colostomy and then to divert the stool away from the lower end. In the final stage, the anal canal is reconstructed through sphincter muscles without any damage,” said Dr Patankar.
What is crucial in this surgery is to help the lower intestine to be carefully routed through the spincter muscles. “In her case, the muscles have never been used. Any kind of damage would have led to permanent loss of control of stool and gas passage,” said Dr Patankar.
This problem was not detected even by the family doctor of the family. “It’s important to know that this problem is not a curse, but is medically correctable,” said Dr Patankar.
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