Plastic and reconstructive surgery
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Plast. Reconstr. Surg. · Dec 2001
Clinical Trial Controlled Clinical TrialDermal substitution in acute burns and reconstructive surgery: a subjective and objective long-term follow-up.
Tissue engineering and dermal substitution are currently prominent topics of wound-healing research. However, no extensive clinical trials with objective evaluation criteria have been published so far that support the clinical effectiveness of dermal equivalents in the long term. The dermal substitute that is discussed here is derived from bovine collagen and elastin-hydrolysate and has been shown to improve skin elasticity during a short-term clinical follow-up of scar reconstructions. ⋯ Forty-two paired burn wounds and 44 paired scar reconstructions were included and evaluated 1 year after surgery. Although substituted scar reconstructions demonstrated an elasticity improvement of approximately 20 percent compared with control wounds, no statistically significant differences were found for skin elasticity, scar contraction, Vancouver Scar Scale, and patient's impression in both categories after 1 year. An extensive long-term follow-up shows that the dermal substitute, which was proven effective in a clinical trial on a short-term basis, did not yield statistical evidence for a long-term clinical effectiveness of dermal substitution.
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Plast. Reconstr. Surg. · Dec 2001
Biography Historical ArticlePaulus Aegineta, a seventh century encyclopedist and surgeon: his role in the history of plastic surgery.
Paulus Aegineta (625-690 ad), born on the island of Aegina, practiced medicine at Alexandria. The last of the eclectic Greek compilers in the Byzantine period, he wrote an Epitome of medicine in seven books. The sixth book, which is considered the best section of his work, is devoted mainly to surgery. ⋯ This Grecian master influenced not only his own but also the subsequent ages. Rhazes, Haly Abbas, Albucasis, Avicenna, and Fabricius ab Aquapendente were the greatest physicians influenced by Paulus Aegineta. Because the work of Paulus Aegineta was the only source for many of the surgical treatises of Arabian authors, his Epitome bridged Western and Eastern medicine and conveyed surgical experience and knowledge, including several plastic surgery procedures, to the subsequent ages.