Successfully reattached a sailor's finger after 25 hours of being severed

On December 9, Viet Duc Friendship Hospital announced that its doctors had successfully performed microsurgery to reattach a finger to a sailor whose finger had been severed after 25 hours.

While on duty on a ship traveling through the central sea on October 22, Mr. D. (38 years old), a sailor, had a serious accident. Storm No. 12 made landfall, causing the ship to rock violently at the time Mr. D. was repairing equipment. The sudden impact caused his right index finger to be severed.

Fortunately, the crew on board quickly provided first aid and preserved the severed limb in a thermos, brought him ashore and took him to the nearest medical facility in the Central region. He then took the earliest flight from Da Nang to Hanoi early the next morning to Viet Duc Friendship Hospital. The total time of anemia was up to 25 hours.

The patient's finger after microsurgery and has recovered well. (Photo: PV/Vietnam+)

In the operating room, the emergency surgical team was deployed with the coordination of many specialties: microsurgery, anesthesia, resuscitation, orthopedic trauma... Two surgical teams were deployed in parallel, one team cleaned and prepared the severed finger, the other team prepared the stump. The finger bone was positioned and fixed with a specialized needle to create a stable axis, the tendon and ligament system was restored. In particular, the nerves and tiny blood vessels of only about 0.8-1mm were restored with high precision under a surgical microscope with special tools to ensure the restoration of blood circulation to the severed part.

Dr. Vu Trung Truc - Deputy Head of the Department of Maxillofacial, Plastic and Aesthetic Surgery, who directly performed the surgery, shared that this was an extremely special case. In cases of limb reattachment, prolonged ischemia is often a huge obstacle. In this case, thanks to the proper preservation of the severed limb at the scene, the finger joint did not stiffen because it was preserved at the right temperature. Another factor is that the finger structure (including: bones, skin, nerves, blood vessels) has the ability to withstand ischemia better than the limb with more muscles, so the finger was ischemic for 25 hours but could still be reattached.

After surgery, the patient's wound has healed, the finger is pink and completely alive, the patient can have the stitches removed and the fixing needle removed. The patient is undergoing rehabilitation exercises to regain the mobility and feeling of the finger./.

(Vietnam+)

Source: https://www.vietnamplus.vn/noi-thanh-cong-ngon-tay-sau-25-gio-bi-dut-roi-cho-mot-thuy-thu-post1081903.vnp