A tumour weighing more than nine stone has been removed from a man who had been told by doctors he was just fat.
Roger Logan, 57, from Gulfport, Mississippi, had the non-cancerous 130lb growth removed at Bakersfield Memorial Hospital, California, on January 31, where he will remain for another week or so.
The tumour, which sprouted from his lower stomach more than a decade ago, probably started as an ingrown hair that became infected, swelled and developed its own blood supply, Mr Logan’s surgeon, Dr Vipul Dev, told the Bakersfield Californian.
But doctors told him, ‘You’re just fat, it’s just fat’, Mr Logan told KERO-TV in Bakersfield.
The tumour grew so massive that it hung to the floor when Mr Logan sat down.
‘I used to equate it, you just put a strap around your neck and carry three bags of cement around with you all day long, just swinging,’ he said.
Virtually unable to move, he spent most of his time in a recliner in one room of his home.
By the time the tumour reached 130-140lbs doctors told Mr Logan it was too risky for him to have surgery, giving him only a 50% chance of surviving it.
But his wife Kitty scoured the country for specialists to perform the operation and found Dr Dev, who had performed similar surgeries.
‘She just kept pushing,’ Mr Logan told the Californian. ‘She wouldn’t let me quit.’
He finally made the 2,000-mile, 40-hour trip to California with his chair bolted to the floor of a cargo van ‘just like I was in my living room at home’.
Last Thursday Mr Logan was able to walk for practically the first time in years.
‘My feet are together,’ he said, wiggling his toes in his hospital bed. ‘They haven’t been together in years.’
Now he is looking forward to returning home and resuming his life – out of an armchair.
