Mankind has come a long way from the medieval methods of surgery. With innovations in healthcare and cutting edge equipment, we take a look at five extraordinary and innovative surgical procedures that have changed patients’ lives for the better. 1. Rotationplasty In a rotationplasty, surgeons remove the bottom of the femur all the way to the upper tibia, rotate the lower leg by 180 degrees, and reattach it to the stump of the thigh. Simply put, the ankle joint is reconstructed to function as the knee, after which a prosthesis can be fitted. Rotationplasty is most commonly performed in young patients who suffer from malignant bone tumours near the knee, which have not been responsive to treatment. "The surgery has allowed me to do so much more than I expected and I would never go back and change it," said Gabi Shull, who was diagnosed with osteosarcoma of the knee and underwent a rotationplasty. Gabi is now a competitive dancer. 2. Osteo-odonto-keratoprosthesis Known as a “tooth-in-eye” surgery, the osteo-odonto-keratoprosthesis (OOKP) procedure involves removal of a patient’s canine or pre-molar tooth, and insertion of a plastic lens into the tooth through a pre-drilled hole. The tooth is then implanted into the patient’s cheek for a few months, removed, and implanted into the affected eye. This technique enables light to travel through the lens and restores the patient’s vision. The procedure was first mooted in the early 1960s by Benedetto Strampelli, of San Camillo Hospital, and is recommended only for patients whose blindness are a result of irreversible damage to the cornea and are unresponsive to other treatment options. “I have my independence back now and I can start looking after the kids while my wife is out at work,” said Ian Tibbetts who underwent OOKP at the Sussex Eye Hospital in 2012 after a work accident left him blind. 3. Hemispherectomy A hemispherectomy is a radical procedure that is usually performed on patients suffering from severe neurological disorders that result in seizures – it involves the partial removal or disconnection of one of the two hemispheres of the brain. A study even found that children’s academic performances improved after they became seizure-free following hemispherectomies. This surgery is not without its side effects, and patients who undergo the procedure may have paralysis and loss of sensation contra-lateral to the side of the brain that has been removed. However, according to John Freeman, a neurologist from Johns Hopkins, "The younger a person is when they undergo hemispherectomy, the less disability you have in talking.” “Where on the right side of the brain speech is transferred to and what it displaces is something nobody has really worked out." 4. Heterotopic heart transplant Unlike a traditional heart transplant, heterotopic heart transplantation implants the donor heart to the right of the patient’s own heart. Both the organs are surgically attached to direct blood flow from the damaged heart to the donor heart, allowing the new organ to pump blood throughout the body. Also known as a “piggyback” transplant, the procedure is suited for patients whose heart problems cause severe pulmonary hypertension. Tyson Smith underwent the procedure in 2011 after suffering from advanced heart failure. "Removing the old heart and replacing it with a new heart would have caused the new heart to fail, because resistance to flow in his lungs - called pulmonary hypertension - was so high,” said Dr. Michael Madani, of the University of California-San Diego Sulpizio Cardiovascular Center. “But together, the two hearts share the work and get the job done.” 5. Grafting body parts Doctors worldwide have sought this approach – which involves temporarily implanting or attaching body parts, such as severed fingers or a section of the skull, below the skin onto another part of the patient’s anatomy – in order to save patients’ body parts. One such individual who underwent the procedure was Jamie Hilton, a former beauty queen. After she smashed her head against a rock from a four-metre fall, doctors at the hospital were forced removed a quarter of her skull to relieve the increasing intracranial pressure. In order to salvage the skull, the sewed it into her abdomen, keeping the bone healthy and sterile. Over a month after the incident, doctors re-implanted her skull back in its original place, and she has since recovered from the surgery. Doctors in China used the same technique to save a young girl’s hand – after it was run over by a tractor – by grafting it on to her leg, and re-transplanted her hand after three months. “Ming Li (the patient) can now move her wrist again and her left hand is a healthy pink colour proving that the blood is circulating well,” said the hospital’s spokesman, Dr Hou Jianxi, who added that physiotherapy would aid in her recovery. Source
