KARACHI, June 8: A two-day workshop on Functional Endoscopic Sinus Surgery, the first hands-on workshop on this subject at any public sector hospital in the country, opened at the Sindh Medical College on Friday.
ENT surgeons from across the country are participating in the workshop, which has been organised by the Department of ENT, Head and Neck Surgery, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre.
The chairman of ENT, Head and Neck Surgery Department, Dr Tariq Rafi, who is also the course director, said this was the first time that a hands-on training workshop on Functional Endoscopic Sinus Surgery had been arranged at any public sector hospital in the country.
He said the functional endoscopic sinus surgery was introduced two years back in Pakistan. It was the latest surgical technique for treatment of sinuses. “No scalpel is used in the method and as such there is no need of stitches,” he said, adding that the function and shape of the nose remains undisturbed.
“Though it’s an expensive treatment costing about Rs52,000 to Rs70,000 at a private hospital, the JPMC offers it free of cost to all,” he said, adding that nasal diseases were on the rise due to increasing pollution in Karachi.
Dr Rafi said allergy had emerged as a major problem and a fairly large number of people suffered from nasal polyps, small growths of inflamed mucus membrane usually occurring in the top of the nose that causes blockage and makes breathing difficult, besides decreasing the senses of taste and smell.
Dr Imtiaz A. Siddiqui, the course coordinator, said that other areas of nasal and allied structures could be treated through this technique. Even skull-based surgery of pituitary glands could be done with this method without opening the skull, he added.
The vice-chancellor of Dow University of Health Sciences, Prof (Dr) Masood Hameed Khan, who was the chief guest, said the university had been organising various workshops on surgical techniques on a regular basis. He said a faculty of public health administration would soon be introduced which would help manage 3,000 hospitals under the Sindh government.
He also thanked the SMC for providing the course facilities. JPMC Executive Director Prof Rasheed Jooma highlighted the use of latest surgical techniques at JPMC, which, he said, had become one of the best public sector hospitals in the country.
Dr Zaki Helal from Al-Ain Medical University, Cairo, will conduct the course in which 110 ENT surgeons are participating from all over the country. Dr Aleem Abdul Qadir, Dr Imtiaz A. Siddiqui, Dr Sameer Qureshi, Dr M. Usman, Dr Javed Jamali would assist him during the workshop.