The other day, doctors from Lviv, together with the famous British reconstructive surgeon Sara Tucker, performed an extremely complex reconstructive operation. At the NEZLAMNI National Rehabilitation Center, they transplanted tissues from the back to the limb to save the leg from amputation of a 40-year-old woman who was injured by a Russian missile attack.
Oksana Lukyanets – from Bakhmut. In July, she was dug up barely alive from a 5-meter-high crater formed by the arrival of a Russian missile. Oksana was taken to the Dnipro Hospital in extremely serious condition: shrapnel wounds to the right lung and liver, extensive wounds to the left shoulder, an open fracture of both legs and the right arm. They fought for her life in the intensive care unit for eleven days.
As soon as the condition was stabilized, Oksana was taken by an evacuation train to the National Rehabilitation Center NEZLAMNI of the First Medical Association of Lviv. Treating wounds to the abdomen, arms, and legs and saving the lower limb, which has a complex open fracture, from amputation – this is exactly the task the doctors set before themselves.
The patient courageously endured more than 10 surgical interventions. In the end, surgeons resort to a complex reconstructive “free flap” operation.
The surgeons performed this intervention together with Sarah Tucker, a well-known British reconstructive surgeon from the Oxford Clinic. They took a flap of the broadest muscle of the back and transplanted it to the injured part of the leg, stitching together the smallest vessels.
The operation, which lasted 12 hours, ended successfully: the exposed bone was closed, the transplanted area of tissue took root and the blood supply was restored.
“Such technologies give a chance to save limbs, faces, organs and body parts, prevent amputations of limbs and significantly improve the quality of life of patients with war trauma. Now we can say for sure: the transplanted muscle has taken root. The limb is saved. And although Oksana will have to undergo several more operations on the bone, she will definitely be able to walk on her own legs,” concludes the First Medical Association of Lviv.
Hundreds of people suffer every day due to Russian aggression, so in order to make their treatment and rehabilitation comfortable and accessible in Ukraine, a multidisciplinary team works with every Ukrainian in the National Rehabilitation Center UNBROKEN in Lviv, providing surgical, physical, psychological and psychosocial professional assistance. Thanks to the support of donors, a prosthetic workshop has already been opened and bionic prostheses are being installed.
Project website: https://unbroken.org.ua/