Woman and girl get free breast reduction surgery

Surgeons successfully carried out breast reduction on a woman and a girl at the Kilifi County Hospital on Friday.

The surgeons were led by Prof Stanley Khainga - a renowned plastic surgeon and also a lecturer at the University of Nairobi’s department of Plastic and Constructive surgery.

Prof Khainga led three other doctors in the surgery on 34-year-old Aisha Salim from Mtaani village within Kilifi Town and a 14-year-old from Kikambala in the county.

Both have been suffering from gigantomastia, a rare condition where a person develops excessively large breasts that later on causes health complications.
The girl has had the condition for the last one year while Ms Aisha has had it since she was 14.

Addressing the press after the end of the surgery, which was supported by the county government in and the Gigantomastia Foundation, Prof Khainga said the surgery was successful.

“In the first operation, we carried out on the girl, we retrieved 6kg tissue, three on every breast and for the woman we retrieved a total of 6.7kg,” said Prof Khainga.

Once a woman suffers from gigantomastia, he said, she will always complain of back aches, fatigue and other unevenly body reactions he said always needs.

He raised concerns over non-committal insurance companies in paying for such illnesses since they have always classified them as beauty related plastic surgeries.

“Carrying out breast reduction is costly especially in private health institutions where an operation can go for as high as Sh500,000. Unfortunately insurance companies never pay for these services because they classify them as beauty initiatives that one has to take them at an individual level,” he said.

Prof Khainga said it is the same message he gave to President Uhuru Kenyatta when he visited the theatre to witness the operation when he visited the hospital to inspect new health equipment bought by the National Government at a cost of Sh400 million at the hospital.

BREAST REDUCTION

“The President was here and I have told him to look how insurance companies can be compelled to pay for medical initiatives like the breast reduction because removing even half of any tissue in the body means there is a problem,” said Prof Khainga.

Gigantomastia Foundation founder Ruth Makena said she formed the foundation after suffering from the same problem.

“I was operated at a cost of Sh500, 000 and had a total of 7.3kgs tissues removed from my breasts, 3.4kgs on my left breast and 3.9kgs on my right breast,” she said.

After the successful surgery which was conducted by Prof Khainga and his team, Ms Makena formed the foundation to assist girls and women who have no funds to cater for such surgeries.

“We have so far conducted 15 surgeries and one of them was in Kiambu where we removed 9.5kgs of tissues from a 13 year old-girl. You can see how heavy her chest was,” she said. More than 200 women she said are in her waiting list to undergo the operations.

She urged the society to desist from believing in myths and traditions saying Gigantomastia is a disease caused by hormonal imbalance and it is not caused by witchcraft.

“Some women if they develop these symptoms think that they were bewitched and run to a herbalist. No they should seek medical services and should not hide,” she said.