24-year-old couldn't eat for three months as every meal triggered unbearable pain and vomiting; doctors later found a hidden pancreatic pseudocyst

At 24 years of age, Dhanush had just finished his final semester of college and started working as a delivery person to support his family. But life turned upside down and hazy for the next few months. He began having stomach aches, easy enough to dismiss at first, which went on to increase with time, with no known diagnosis any local medical centre or hospital could point to. Three months passed by, and Dhanush could no longer eat as eating could immediately lead to vomiting and severe pain. Despite visiting various hospitals for months, he could not get a permanent solution. He was desperate for an answer… an answer that came through an event held by the Indian Medical Association (IMA). Dr. Manjunath Haridas, Consultant - Colorectal & GI Surgery & Robotic Surgery, Manipal Hospital Whitefield, delivered a talk on robotic surgery in Chikkaballapur when one of the local surgeons in the audience, who had earlier evaluated Dhanush, reached out to the doctor after the session for a possible treatment option. At the hospital, a CT scan and an MR scan revealed acute pancreatitis that slowly led to a fluid collection in the posterior part of the stomach (behind the stomach). In medical terms, it was called a pancreatic pseudocyst, measuring approximately 10 by 6 centimetres. The swelling was pressing against his digestive tract, making eating nearly impossible and keeping him in constant pain.“This young boy had been suffering in silence for three months with pain, nausea, vomiting, and moving from hospital to hospital, where they lacked the right tool or technology to treat the condition. We identified that this was something we could treat robotically, and that’s exactly what we did,” noted Dr Manjunath Haridas.The procedure required to drain the pseudocyst safely, and robotic precision was needed to achieve that. Using the robotic platform, Dr Manjunath Haridas and his team performed the surgery, draining the large fluid collection with precision that minimally invasive techniques allow. Dhanush’s recovery was swift. Within days, he was eating again. The pain was gone. Today, he is back to life; studying, eating what he loves, and looking ahead to the career that once felt so close before illness intervened.