LAHORE, Aug 6 (China Economic Net) - Surgeons at Lahore's Ghurki Trust Teaching Hospital have removed a pelvic tumour and rebuilt a patient's hip using a customised implant produced with Chinese 3D-printing technology.

The operation, on 15 June, was performed on a 26-year-old patient with a rare inherited bone condition who had developed chondrosarcoma, a form of bone cancer, in the socket of the left hip. The tumour, and the bone that had to be removed with it, made conventional reconstruction particularly difficult, Farshine Medical, the Chinese firm that made the implant, said in response to a written inquiry from China Economic Net (CEN).

Pakistani surgeons removed the cancer-affected part of the pelvis while preserving the patient's leg, then fitted a custom-designed, 3D-printed partial pelvic implant and performed a total hip replacement. Farshine said the operating team was led by Prof Amer Aziz.

Beforehand, the medical team rehearsed the operation using a printed model of the tumour and patient-specific surgical guides, planning where to cut the bone, how the implant would sit and how the hip would be reconstructed.

Ali Ijaz Ahmad, clinical lead for sarcoma services at Ghurki Trust and a member of the operating team, said in a LinkedIn post it was the hospital's first use of patient-specific instruments and 3D printing in orthopaedic cancer surgery. He described the rehearsal, which he called a "mock surgery", as a critical step, allowing the team to verify bone cuts, guide positioning and implant fit before entering the operating room.

Farshine told CEN it had chosen Pakistan as the first market in its overseas expansion because of close bilateral ties, geographic proximity and what it called a favourable policy environment. It planned to work with more Pakistani hospitals and enter other medical fields, it added.

The case comes as Pakistan faces a growing need for specialised cancer treatment. The International Agency for Research on Cancer estimates Pakistan had about 190,300 new cancer cases and 119,700 cancer deaths in 2024, according to GLOBOCAN figures published in July 2026.

It also forms part of expanding China-Pakistan cooperation in advanced medical technology. In November 2025, the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in Islamabad performed the capital's first robotic adrenalectomy — removal of an adrenal gland — using the Chinese-developed Toumai surgical robot.