QEQM team introduce new bowel cancer surgery technique

A grandfather was one of the first in east Kent to have part of his bowel removed and reconnected inside his body.

David Haddaway had the procedure at the Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital in Margate with consultant general and colorectal surgeon Mr Mohamed Boshnaq, after being diagnosed with bowel cancer.

Traditionally, surgeons would pull the bowel outside the body to remove the cancer and stitch it back together, and the team at QEQM are one of the first in Kent and the south east to offer the new technique. It is more technically demanding but has many benefits for patients, including a much smaller incision, reduced pain and a faster recovery.

David, from Ramsgate, said: “My dad had the same cancer and was diagnosed at the same age, but he died two years later so I feel very lucky indeed.

“Everything happened so quickly, it was amazing.

“Mr Boshnaq mentioned it would be a new procedure but I wasn’t worried; he is so professional and exactly what you would want in a surgeon. The Macmillan nurses were also fantastic.

“I had no pain at all after the surgery and it all felt very easy. Now I have these tiny little scars but otherwise you wouldn’t know at all.”

David, who has six granddaughters, was diagnosed with bowel cancer after feeling increasingly unwell, to the point where he couldn’t walk more than 100 yards.

The 73-year-old vintage postcard dealer said: “I love gardening, but I couldn’t do it for more than three minutes, and I was having to get people in to do the jobs for me.

“Initially they thought it was my lung condition, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) worsening, but it wasn’t that.

“When I had all the tests, that’s when they found a tumour in my bowel and it was bleeding and had been for a while.

“I had two per cent of the red blood cells I should have had, so I wouldn’t have lasted much longer without treatment.”

Mr Boshnaq and fellow consultant general and colorectal surgeon Aftab Khan have now performed more than 10 successful procedures, known as intracorporeal anastomosis, for cancer patients.

Mr Boshnaq said: “It is a high-level laparoscopic technique where the bowel is reconnected inside the abdomen, rather than being pulled through a larger incision to be joined outside (extracorporeal anastomosis).

“While many hospitals perform keyhole surgery for colon cancer, performing the anastomosis entirely intracorporeally is technically demanding. Most district general hospitals in the south east still perform extracorporeal anastomosis.

“QEQM is one of the first in Kent and the wider south east to adopt the laparoscopic intracorporeal anastomosis technique for right-sided colonic resections. By keeping everything inside, the incision size is minimized, which leads to faster recovery, less pain, and a significantly lower risk of post-operative hernias compared to the older methods.”