A large tumor was removed from the face of a lady after she was stoned by people who believed she was possessed.
Pascaline Patienda, who is 23 years old, said that people in her town of Digre, which is located in Burkina Faso, Africa, made fun of her because of the bulk that was on her face.
When she was 15 years old, the uncommon benign tumor known as an ameloblastoma started to develop, ultimately causing damage to her jaw and teeth.
Charity workers saw Ms. Patienda walking along the street and volunteered to assist her when they learned that she lacked the financial means to pay for medical care.
They spoke with doctors at the Vithas Valencia 9 Octubre hospital in Spain, and those physicians consented to performing the €40,000 (£34,000) procedure at no cost throughout the month of September.
After two months, Ms. Patienda has regained the ability to move her mouth in a completely normal manner and will soon be returning home.
Dr. Ignacio Solis, who operated on Ms. Patienda, shared the following statement with Central European News (CEN): “I was contacted by a doctor from the organization Amor en Accio (Love in Action), and he told me the story of Pascaline.”
She was even stoned in addition to being cut off from the rest of the group. It was thought that she was possessed by a malevolent spirit, indicating that the problem was not only a physical one.
Because the tumor had affected her teeth and caused them to shift, the lady was unable to eat in the normal manner.
Amor en Acción has two registered nurses who are stationed in Burkina Faso during the whole year. One day, while they were strolling around the neighborhood, they came across Ms. Patienda and were ‘curious’ in her peculiarity.
The young lady could only communicate with them in a regional dialect, and she had no comprehension of their French.
However, she was able to inform them of the length of time the tumor had been there as well as the fact that she had never seen a doctor.
The staff assured her that they would be able to assist her, and she ultimately decided to go to Valencia, Spain, in order to have the operation done there.
A fragment of Ms. Patienda’s fibula was used in the reconstruction of her face by Dr. Solis and his colleagues. The fibula is located in the lower leg.
After the bone material had been removed from her leg, it was reconstructed into the patient’s face and then connected to the patient’s arteries and veins so that she could receive blood.
After some time, it was repaired with a new layer of skin, and implants were placed in the teeth.
The procedure, which was made possible by funding from the Foundation Vithas, the hospital, and the non-governmental organization Amor en Accio, was quite involved.
The surgeon estimates that it will set you back around 40,000 Euros (or 34,000 pounds). However, they didn’t get paid for their job.
Ms. Patienda has been released from the hospital, and on December 5th, she will go back to Burkina Faso, where the physicians who work there will continue to monitor her recuperation.
According to what Dr. Solis had to say about the patient, “She is very happy. She cannot communicate because she only speaks her local language. She lives in a very poor village with her family.” However, the patient was able to communicate through signs.
An ameloblastoma is a slow-growing benign tumor that begins in the jaw, often around the wisdom teeth, and spreads throughout the jaw. It could make it difficult to talk or eat.
As a standard course of treatment, surgery is performed to remove the diseased tissue as well as a portion of the surrounding healthy tissue in order to stop the growth of the tumor.
Doctors Angeles Almela, Hector Guiral, and Sergi Salas, together with nurse Carolina Garcia, professor Gonzalo, and Carmen Musitur, were the original founders of the non-governmental organization (NGO) Amor en Accio.
