Anatomy and Art

As I sit here typing this, a very good friend of mine is currently undergoing hand surgery.  We’d actually talked about me maybe coming and taking pictures of the whole thing if her doctors were comfortable with it.  But such things really are much more easily arranged through the surgeons than they are through the patients.  So now, she’s in there with just the surgeons, which I hate, since they’re keeping her awake for this.  And I’m also missing what could be my last chance to view a hand surgery.  That may sound odd if you’re not involved in my line of work, but I had wanted and planned to see a hand surgery as part of my training in anaplastology.  Particularly for the somatic work, it made sense to get a closer look at things.  But the timing never worked out and it didn’t come to be.

Hands are such fascinating complicated pieces of anatomy.  I hate that my friend hurt hers while coming to see me in celebration of my finishing grad school no less!  But right now, I’m on the patient’s side of the equation.  And I’m trusting that she’s in good care.  And I’m hoping that someone in there is talking to her and keeping this from being a terrible experience for her. If anyone could keep good spirits about them through a thing like this though, it’s my friend, Jasmine.

She told me that they’re reducing one of her carpal bones.  It’s not a procedure I’m familiar with.

This is about as familiar as I get with the carpal bones.  And it’s been a couple of years now since I got this involved in knowing about them.  Starting from the most commonly broken big one at the base there and working around, their names are scaphoid, lunate, triquetrum, pisiform (that little ball on top of triquetrum), hamate, capitate, trapezoid, and trapezium (which I keep thinking could be the one my friend is having reduced today since we’ve been calling it a broken thumb.)

But aside from their names, basic shapes, and a little bit of trivia about them, I really don’t know much about these little guys we have all jumbled up in our wrists.  I wish I was in there right now, getting the low down what they’re doing for my friend.  But I’m not.  So, like millions of friends and loved ones of patients before, and millions more to come, I can only think good wishes to her and hope for the best.

So, I was going to wait until I’d shown this in my big presentation next month, but I just couldn’t.  I put it up tonight.

Introducing, The Bilateral Sagittal Split Osteotomy and Osseous Genioplasty…

And if that doesn’t work, here’s a direct link to the YouTube page itself – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQI8L5Sxa6w

Yesterday morning I did my first surgical observation.  The four of us taking Animation II this semester decided to go in and witness first hand a cataract surgery in preparation for the animation we are creating.  It was pretty amazing.  There was a lot of prep and making sure that everything was in order.  The patient was nerve blocked, but fully conscious the entire time.  I couldn’t help wondering what that all could possibly have looked like from his perspective.  All in all, I think the surgery went on about an hour.  They used a Leica system for viewing.  I had the opportunity to look through the lens myself, and you can really see just amazing detail through the microscope.  After the lens was emulsified, vacuumed out, and replaced, they used tiny stitches to close the incisions, and wrapped the eye in gauze.  When they were done, the patient just said “thank you” and they wheeled him out.  We wanted to ask the patient about his experience, but he was taken away too quickly.  So last night I called my grandmother, who has been through the same surgery herself.  In her case, she said she was given some kind of sedative, though she was awake.  As for her view of the procedure while being worked on, she described it as mostly a blur of twinkling lights.  I can’t say as I’m anxious to be the one on the table any time soon, but it was fascinating to witness surgery from the OR like that.

*image is taken from Karkhanis Super Specialty Hospital