Week 3: New Platinum Eye(lid)wear and pearl earrings

I bet a good portion of you reading this have gotten eyewear to correct vision problems, and I bet all of you have experienced the feeling of closing your eyes to go to sleep at the end of a long day. For a patient with a partial facial paralysis and the inability to close their eye, a different kind of hardware for the eye is required to give them the ability to close their eyes. Eye weights are weighted pieces of gold or platinum which can be implanted within the eyelid to make it heavy enough to close.  I watched the implantation of platinum eye weights into a patient who had nerve damage to the facial nerve and could not close their eye, However,they had an undamaged cranial nerve allowing them to open their eye. The idea of the eye weight is that is makes the eye lid heavy enough that when it starts to close the weight will cause the eyelid to close the rest of the way. I watched this operation last week and during the procedure the eyelid was cut open and the layers were separated. The thin platinum weight was placed in the eyelid and sutured into place near the lash line. The eyelid was closed back up and sutured. This week in clinic I got to see the patient 1 week post-op for a suture removal. The patients eye was still swollen but they were able to close it partially with a better closure possible when the swelling goes down. 

Another interesting case spanning last week and this week involved pearl earrings that are both functional and pretty.  Last week keloids were removed from the patients ears and to prevent re-occurrence she had compression earrings put on this week to reduce swelling. The magnetic earrings with broad flat backs apply pressure to the incision site by compressing the earlobe.  I thought these were a cleaver medical device because they were functional while also looking nice to increase patient compliance.

I have been fortunate to see a wide variety of patients in clinic and in the OR. I saw things ranging from Botox to hypertrophic scar removal to full abdominal wall reconstructions after hernias. Most things go very well but I have also seen less ideal situations such as infected wound sites which had to be re-opened and flushed with bleach based solution. To clean the wound, stitches were removed to open it up and it was irrigated with a bleach based solution to remove the puss. Cultures were sent to determine the best antibiotics to give the patient.  

Before this experience, I never realized the potential of plastic surgeons to use pieces of the body to replace other parts to regain structure and function.  Also in clinic this week I saw a patient who had to have 90% of their tongue removed. The plastic surgery team was able to harvest a muscle flap and skin from the thigh to create a new tongue. The patient was able to regain the ability to eat and speak with this newly reconstructed tongue.

In lab, I am working with adipose samples to decellularize them. This is a lengthy 2 week process but the first round from the first adapted protocol is ready to be analyzed. This week I was trained on tissue fixation, processing, paraffin embedding, and sectioning and I am excited to be able to start using these new techniques next week. I am also in the process of testing and developing other protocols.

Beyond the walls of the hospital, I saw Phantom of the Opera last weekend and have been humming the music ever since. I've been enjoying the wide variety of food that New York has to offer and have been balancing the food intake with evening walks with friends through central park, along the river. or through the city.