Supratim Dutta

Supratim Dutta, an HCL executive, is a 23 year old male, who achieved instantaneous fame on July 12, 2008 (Saturday), when during a road side vehicular accident, a two-inch wide and five-feet-long iron rod pierced through-and-through his body and remained embedded for 90 minutes. Miraculously he survived and was successfully operated at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) trauma center. His unique case brought to memory the similar case of Phineas Gage, when a similar rod passed through and through his skull and he survived.

The rod entered Dutta's body from the front when his car rammed into a construction site on Mehrauli-Gurgaon road. It remained embedded for one-and-a-half hours before he was taken to AIIMS. A meticulous surgery was carried out to remove the rod. The rod was removed from side to side, rather than longitudinally.

The rod pierced through the upper part of his abdomen and came out of the thorax (chest) on the left side of the body. Surprisingly even in that condition, he gathered strength to call up his family and friends for help. Locals had gathered by that time and managed to cut the angle and rushed him to the trauma centre.

Many people would imagine that Supratim cheated death, but actually he could do so, because the rod, despite having passed through and through his body, missed his vital parts - the kidney and the heart. However some of the organs - not vital for survival - were damaged such as stomach and spleen.

Another reason for Dutta's survival is that the rod was not extricated from his body on the spot by bystanders. Otherwise, he would have almost surely exsanguinated to death. An analogy can perhaps make it easier to understand. When the rod passes through the body, important blood vessels get punctured and the rod itself seals them. It is like a nail stuck in a tyre. If it is taken out, the tyre gets punctured. Till it is in, the tyre remains blown up. The same happened when the angle pierced through his blood vessels. Had anybody tried to take that rod out, Dutta would have suffered immense blood loss, leading to his death. But luckily he was brought with the angle in.

A team of anaesthetists, trauma centre specialists and surgeons and workers from the blood bank struggled for nearly six hours and contributed to his survival.

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July 17 Supratim Dutta, the 23-year-old executive with HCL who was admitted to AIIMS after a two-inch wide and five-feet-long iron rod pierced through his body, has survived the accident. Doctors at the AIIMS Trauma Centre were able to perform a successful surgery that extricated the rod without causing any damage to his vital organs.
Calling it one of the “rarest of rare surgeries”, Dr M C Mishra, chief of the AIIMS Trauma Centre, said: “We were astonished when he was brought to the hospital. But we planned the surgery meticulously. We had to decide how to extricate the rod which had fortunately missed his vital organs.”

On July 12, Dutta was on his way to his Gurgaon office when his driver lost control and collided with the construction barricades on the Gurgaon-Mehrauli road. The impact of the collision caused the iron rod to pierce through the dashboard and impale Dutta.

The rod remained embedded inside his body for 90 minutes before he was taken to hospital. Dutta, however, did not lose consciousness and instead called his relatives and friends on the phone. Locals cut the rod and rushed him to AIIMS. “Fortunately, they did not try to extricate the rod from Dutta’s body. Had they done that, it could have proved fatal,” a doctor at AIIMS said.

The surgery was not an easy one. “To start with, anesthesia was an issue because Dutta could not lie down, so we had to anaesthetise him in a sitting position. It was not a standard operation but fortunately we were successful,” Mishra said.

Dutta will have to remain in the hospital for the next two weeks. “While there is no long-lasting damage, he is at risk of infection and will stay under observation,” Mishra explained. The doctor said Dutta is talking and is being allowed to walk around a little. “He is doing a few breathing exercises and has not complained of any pain in the affected area. He did complain about some pain in the neck but that was due to being anaesthetised in a sitting position,” Mishra said.

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