Valerie is the first in Kent to have life-saving procedure

A great-grandmother was the first patient in Kent to have keyhole surgery to repair a life-threatening bulge in a blood vessel in her chest.

Valerie Brown needed surgery after the bulge developed in her aorta, the main artery carrying blood away from her heart.

It had grown from 3.2cm in 2020 to 4.8cm, and could have been fatal if it had burst.

Until now, patients would need to have surgery in London, but consultant vascular and endovascular surgeon Mr Sandeep Bahia was able to carry out the procedure at the Kent and Canterbury Hospital. Mr Bahia introduced complex abdominal aneurysm repairs to K&C in 2022, however this was the first procedure the unit has carried out to treat an aneurysm in the chest.

Valerie, 81, from Margate, said: “I didn’t want the operation at first, and I certainly wouldn’t have had it if I’d had to go to London.

“But when we started looking into it and realised how serious it could be, I decided to go ahead.

“Mr Bahia explained it could be done as keyhole surgery and that was better than the alternative, and he was very reassuring.

“I can’t fault the hospital at all, everyone was lovely and my family were able to visit. It would have been too hard and too expensive for people to travel to London every day to see me.”

Valerie, a retired bookkeeper who also had her own café, was initially diagnosed with a small aneurysm after a CT scan to investigate the causes of anaemia. Another scan after her breathing worsened revealed it had grown.

Mr Bahia said: “I am delighted to have been able to offer Valerie this surgery closer to home, allowing her to be near her family and saving the need to travel.

“This service is possible because of the excellent collaboration between colleagues in vascular surgery, anaesthetics, interventional radiology, critical care, and the perioperative care of the older patient (POPS) team, who worked together to make it a success.

“The keyhole procedure brings far less risk than the traditional open repair, where we would open up the chest, and also allows patients to recover more quickly.

“Being able to perform the surgery at K&C means patients can have full continuity of care, from our excellent admin team all the way through to the surgeon, to help them feel reassured and in good hands.”

The team complete up to 30 complex abdominal aneurysm repairs a year. Valerie’s procedure is known as a thoracic endovascular aneurysm repair, or TEVAR. Surgeons insert a stent to repair the artery, using small incisions in the groin.

Mr Bahia was assisted by Dexter Valencia, consultant interventional radiologist. The complex aortic programme has been developed with support from Dr Emma Sans-Solachi, lead aortic anaesthetist, and the POPS medical team