What is the appropriate age for surgery for a baby with syndactyly? Can the surgery be separated at once? Do you need skin implants during the surgery or not? These are the concerns of many parents and they are very confused about whether to operate or not. Today we are going to talk about these issues through this article.
What is the appropriate age for surgery for syndactyly?
The most appropriate time to operate on a syndactyly is when the child is about 6 months old. This is because children of this age generally weigh more than 6kg and can receive general anesthesia. On the other hand, children’s hands are smaller, so the wound will heal much faster than older children, and the scar at the wound site will be smaller.
Can the surgery be done at once?
It depends on the condition of the child’s hand whether or not it is possible to separate the syndactyly at once. Generally speaking, if it is possible to completely separate the hand in one go, I will usually separate it in one go to reduce the pain of the child and to ease the burden of the parents in caring for the child after surgery.
Do I need a skin graft during the surgery or not?
During the finger splitting process, there are often cases where the skin is too much and the flap transfer method cannot cover the wound completely. In this case, the surgeon will consider covering the wound with a skin graft or using an artificial dermis to induce a skin graft-free method.
Implants are usually taken from the child’s stomach, which can result in significant scarring of the abdomen. For a boy, a scar on his body is not a big deal, but for a girl who loves beauty, it may have a negative psychological impact on her when she grows up. And the skin in the affected area will also develop hyperpigmentation, and the color will look darker than the normal skin of the hand. However, in addition to scarring and color problems, there are also issues such as whether the implant will survive.
In order to reduce the problems caused by these implants, I personally recommend the use of artificial dermis without implants to avoid implants. This can avoid scars on other parts of the body on the one hand, and there is no problem of necrosis on the other hand.
In general, parents should not overthink the surgery of syndactyly split fingers, but find the right hospital and doctor, the treatment result is usually quite good.