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Xiao Wei was able to save his severed hand when Chinese doctors attached it to his ankle, according to a report from ABC News. Wei lost the right hand during an accident on the job, but was unable to have it immediately attached back onto his arm.
The hand was then stitched to Wei’s left ankle by borrowing blood from arteries in the leg. This helps keep the hand alive. Then, one month later, surgeons removed the hand from the left ankle and reattached it to Wei’s arm.
The doctors who operated on Wei are from the Changsha region of China. They claim that Wei is going to need other operations in order for the hand to regain its full functionality. They believe this will also be effective.
“His injury was severe. Besides ripping injuries, his arm was also flattened. We had to clear and treat his injuries before taking on the hand reattachment surgery,” Cairian Healy said. Healy is from the Royal College of Surgeons in England.
“The Chinese are pretty experienced in microsurgery,” he said. “And the concept of saving a severed part of the body by attaching it to another part of the body to give it a blood supply is well recognized. The ankle is a hard place to graft though. Usually surgeons would go for the armpit because the blood supply is better.”
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