A 25-year-old woman, Barsha Das from Krushnaprasad Block of the Puri district, has got a new lease of life with doctors of AIIMS-Bhubaneswar successfully replanting the completely separated left forearm. The medical procedure took around 10 hours.
Barsha Das came to the Emergency Department of AIIMS-Bhubaneswar on December 9 at around 9 pm with traumatic amputation of left forearm below elbow.
As per history given by the patient, she was working at her home and her dupatta got stuck in the rice cutting machine along with her left hand at around 4 pm. She was taken to the local government hospital along with the amputated hand where primary treatment was given, bleeding was secured and dressing was done.
The amputated part was wrapped in a ‘ganjee’ pad and was kept in an ice bath by the person who attended her in the local hospital.
At first, the team of doctors took out the amputated part from the fridge and started bench dissection. All the vital structures were identified. Then the patient was taken into the operating room. Amputated stumps opened and debridement was done and all the vital structures were isolated.
After that, the amputated part was attached to the body by first two bony fixations, and then arterial circulation was established along with vein, followed by two major nerves that were repaired along with muscles and skin, said Dr Sanjay Giri.
The surgery went up till 8 am in the morning and the patient was then shifted to the ICU. After the tenth postoperative day, we took the patient to the operating room again as the skin around the elbow was not good. Today it is around two weeks and the patient’s limb is viable, added Dr Giri.