Two right hands: Kazan surgeons sew a hand cut by reciprocating saw back on
Two young surgeons from the Republican clinical hospital in Kazan have been saving the hand of a dweller of Kukmor for 8 hours
Surgeons of the Republican clinical hospital of Kazan made a unique operation on March 19 — a man was sewed his hand back on. Surgeons usually can cope with a replantation of fingers, for example, but this time a man has had his hand back. What is more, the next day the patient could move his fingers. About the ridiculous injury and the miraculous saving, professionalism and dedication of young doctors — read in the article of Realnoe Vremya.
''I and my hand next to me''
On 19 March, Rafis Khafizov wanted to change the door. He lives in a private house in Kukmor settlement in the Republic of Tatarstan. He is a handyman as they say: he does all the work himself. He prepared a circular saw, took a wooden block — the future door threshold — it was to take only five minutes. He turned on the engine, the disc with huge teeth habitually screamed. How many thousands of times Rafis repeated these movements — carefully directed wood towards a sparkling metallic circle. It seemed that he could do everything with his eyes closed. This arrogance failed him.
''Foolishly… My hand dragged after the wood. I looked aside. It happened suddenly, I did not even realise that hand was torn off,'' recalls Rafis.
A neighbour heard a scream and came, he gave first aid — bandaged the stump with a rope to stop the blood, thrown the severed limb into the package and took Rafis and his hand to the Kukmor hospital.
''I and the hand next to me,'' casually says the patient, apparently, still not coming back from the shock.
Bogov's doctors
At the same time, but only in the Kazan's Republican clinical hospital, a traumatic surgeon Bogov took up duty. The surname is familiar to many people: Bogov reattached severed limbs many times. The media published about the unique operations. In 2008, he had the same patient — with a hand cut by a reciprocating saw. Only that time at the operating table was Andrey Bogov, and on Sunday morning, 19 March 2017, his son, Aleksey, took up duty. Traumatology is the unit where there are no peaceful duties, but this day was out of the ordinary — a baptism of fire for the 29-year-old surgeon if to speak about volumes and complexity of the operation.
''That was not cool. I was in a desperate situation as I was in charge, respectively, I was to do the operation, to assemble a team, to find an assistant. To call a doctor at weekend — it is emotionally problematic, but Marat Fnusovich, thank him so much, came and supported. Thanks to his responsiveness, everything worked out, tells Aleksey Bogov to Realnoe Vremya, he is a traumatologist-orthopedist of the trauma unit of the Republican clinical hospital.
8 hours at the operating table
A colleague and friend of Alexey Bogov, Marat Fartdinov, had a legal day off that day, which he spending at home with his family. But the surgeons according to the Labour Code do not work, he couldn't even dare to say that that day he had already been on duty.
''It is normal when there is a severe case, we postpone everything and come for a big major surgery. It is normal for our unit. It should be so,'' says Marat Fartdinov, a traumatologist-orthopedist of the Republican clinical hospital.
An hour after the phone call, the 28-year-old surgeon was in the clinic. At 9.00 p.m., on the day when Fartdinov had a day off and Bogov, working from 8 a.m., along with an anesthesiologist Aleksandr Dmitriev, an anaesthetist Maksim Timirsyanov and an operating nurse Svetlana Ignatieva started the complex operation that lasted more than 8 hours.
''It was hard to work actually a day without a break, physically hard, only due to our youth we withstood,'' said surgeons, satisfied with the result.
Professional honour and victory
First, we connected the bones, then the most time-consuming stage is to sew vein and artery. This jewellery work is done under a microscope, it is impossible to see surgical sutures with naked eye — the thickness is less than hair. The operation was complicated by the fact that veins on the cut parts of the hand were fragmented, it was impossible to stitch them end-to-end, so they had to cut part from an intact vessel.
''At the end of the operation when we launched the bloodstream, we saw that the hand was getting physiological pink colour. This indicates inflow and outflow of blood and the positive outcome of the operation,'' says Marat Fartdinov.
''That is, we immediately saw the result of our work. It brings a lot of emotions to the surgeons, we work for this reason, for us it is victory and honour,'' adds Aleksey Bogov.
Talking about the technology of the operation, surgeons ask to note that not every hospital has a microscope, and the Republican clinical hospital in this respect is a unique clinic, not to mention the experiences and the doctors who pass this experience to the young colleagues.
People get terrible injuries at home
The next day, Rafis Khafizov could move his fingers. Now he flexes and extends them. The plaster cast prevents a greater range of movements. Once it's taken off, only seams will remind about the terrible injury.
Surgeons regularly do operations of replantation, roughly speaking, sewing of amputated limbs, especially fingers. But this case is unique because they had to restore a large segment of the limb. Usually, the doctors say, patients with such injuries are delivered from home, at workplace, they try to observe safety precautions.
The surgeons of the Republican clinical hospital asked to note the professionalism of colleagues from Kukmor hospital for competently rendered first aid to the patient and transporting the limbs — they packed the cut hand into the container with ice and called sanitary aviation. Particularly due to these actions, doctors had the opportunity to save the patient's hand. The time from injury until admission to the emergency room was 4 hours. If regional physicians delayed — the severed limb would not have been survived.