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Media: Dr. Piñal reconstructs the right hand of a patient who had lost his five fingers in an explosion

12 Февраль, 2017

Marius Constantin_miniatura YT_20170212

Marius Constantin, 28 years old (Zalla, Vizcaya, Spain), lost the five fingers of his right hand last New Year’s Eve due to the explosion of a high-powered firecracker, which left the limb with an effective amputation at the wrist level.

After staying two weeks with the remains of the  limb ‘buried’ in the abdomen, in order to preserve the tissues, Dr. Piñal performed a non-anatomical recreation of the patient’s hand, giving it a functional tripod structure that will allow him to recover basic ‘clamp’ and object manipulation skills.

This new success story of the president of the Advisory Board of the European Wrist Arthroscopy Society (EWAS) has been picked-up by various Spanish media outlets such as TVE, Telecinco, Cuatro, EITB, ABC, El Mundo, El Correo and El Diario Montañés, among others.

During 16 hours of interventions, Dr. Piñal and his surgical team applied a combination of various microsurgical techniques to transplant the large toe of one foot to the location of the thumb. In a second step, the Spanish surgeon transferred the second and third finger, with their respective metatarsals, to complete the ‘recreation’ of a functional hand with two fingers and an opposable thumb.

Portada El Correo_20170202

Dr. Piñal, who has performed hundreds of microsurgery operations with a success rate of 99%, considers reconstruction of vascular and tendinous architecture one of the main challenges in clinical situations of these characteristics: “the reconnection of the transferred arteries, veins and tendons with the ‘salvaged’ remains in the receiving area involves the application of multiple stitches in areas with only one millimeter in diameter.