Brazil: Lula underwent surgery to heal a vocal cord injury

Last Sunday the president-elect of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, spoke to remove a lesion in the larynx detected in recent medical examinations and yesterday Monday he returned home after being discharged, reported the San Pablo hospital where he was being treated.

The leader of the Workers’ Party (PT) he had been diagnosed with laryngeal cancer in 2011from which he fully recovered the following year after chemotherapy treatment, his doctors said.

The laryngeal lesion removed this weekend during a 40-minute operation was discovered during routine medical checkups the previous Saturday, following a months-long presidential campaign effort in which her voice raised concerns.

Sunday’s surgery was for “the removal of leukoplakia in the left vocal cord,” the Syrian Lebanese Hospital said in a statement. The medical report highlighted the “absence of neoplasm”that is, it ruled out malignant tumors due to an abnormal increase in cells.

Good answer

Leukoplakia is the development of plaques or white patches within the oral cavity such as the back of the mouth, tongue or, in Lula’s case, the voice box. They can be early signs of cancer, although progression to malignancy occurs in less than 20% of people.

Dr Roberto Kalil Filho, the cardiologist who accompanied the president-elect and coordinated the removal of the lesions, stressed that most of the cases are benign, the newspapers said. or globe Y Folha de São Paulo.

“Hello. already home, after a little procedure yesterday. All resolved and well ”, wrote Lula, 77, on her social networks together with the note from the medical center, returning to her house yesterday.

The lesion in the larynx, 5 millimeters and superficial, was extracted with a CO 2 laser, O Globo said. The device removes the tumor with a precise laser beam, sparing surrounding structures. During the operation, the doctors took a biopsy to detect malignancy. The result, negative, came out in a few minutes.

The main symptom of leukoplakia in the larynx it is hoarseness of a progressive naturebut it can also cause burning and discomfort due to a foreign body in the throat, pain when swallowing and fatigue when speaking, reported the Folha newspaper.

During the week, Lula attended the climate summit in Egypt, in his first international appearance as Brazil’s president-elect, and then visited Portugal. Lula is expected to assume the presidency of Brazil on January 1.

Background

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Before leaving for Egypt, his team reported that Lula’s study results were “normal,” confirming “complete remission” of a 2-centimeter laryngeal tumor found in 2011 found in the upper glottis, near the vocal cords.

Lula smoked for 50 years and quit smoking in 2010, after being hospitalized with high blood pressure. The cancer was detected at the end of his presidency (2003-2011). In 2012, doctors announced her “full recovery” after chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

Now, following the advice of his doctors, Brazil’s president-elect should avoid excessive use of his voice in the next 15 days, especially in the first week. In the next 24 hours, the recommendation is to rest. But Lula can now speak, as long as she does not commit excesses, her doctors have said.

After this intervention, the expectation is that the leader of the Workers’ Party will present a reduction in the hoarseness that afflicted him after two weeks of recovery in the operated region.

According to her doctors, surgery was recommended after the appearance of white patches, mostly caused by smoking, alcohol and reflux, exacerbated by overuse of her vocal cords. Smoking has been cited as the root cause of the problem.

But the injury would have increased that hoarseness, even more during the campaign, which required excessive use of the voice.

Source: AFP and EFE

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