Ukrainian surgeons performed a heart operation on a military man in a unique way — they say itʼs the first time in the world

Surgeons of the Mykola Amosov National Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery performed a unique operation on the heart of 49-year-old soldier Yurii Sichka without a chest incision. For this, they used intravascular access through the arm.

This was reported by the press service of the Institute.

Yurii Sichka is a former technical worker at a school in the Vinnytsia region. He received a severe chest wound near Bakhmut while helping to evacuate the bodies of the dead. An enemy shell pierced his lung and stuck in his heart.

Doctors performed an emergency operation on the man in Dnipro, but a dangerous problem remained — a hole in the heart artery through which blood entered the heart cavity. This posed a serious threat to life, so Yurii went to Kyiv.

The surgeons decided to perform a unique operation that did not require general anesthesia.

"During the operation, we used an intra-coronary ultrasound machine, which allowed us to see the vessel from the inside and precisely install special stent-grafts — metal structures up to 5 mm in diameter, which closed the damaged area of the artery," the doctors explained.

According to the Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery, this is the first time in the world that a similar operation was performed in this way.

Yuriy is feeling well after the operation. He is currently undergoing rehabilitation.