3D printing replaces section of girl’s skull
Print Edition
A toddler in central China’s Hunan Province has become the first person in the world to have her skull successfully reconstructed with the help of 3D printing technology.
Three-year-old Han Han suffers from congenital hydrocephalus, a condition that causes an abnormal amount of fluid to build up in the brain.
This left her bedridden, as her neck cannot support the weight of her head, which has grown to four times its normal size. Her head weighs about 20 kilograms while she weighs just 32 kilograms in total.
The pressure of the excess fluid has also resulted in infections that could put her at risk of going blind.
But surgeons at Hunan’s Second People’s Hospital based in Changsha, the provincial capital, are trying to fight the condition’s effects with an implant constructed using 3D printing.
They used 3D printing equipment to create a model of the girl’s skull, which they then used to design a titanium mesh to replace the part of the skull that protects the brain.
The surgeons removed a portion of her skull and put the mesh in place in a 17-hour operation.
“After the skull is removed, the brain is like an egg that’s been peeled. It’s wobbly and unstable. We have to drain excess fluid so the membrane can hold tight and prevent the brain from moving too much. We also have to keep the skull pressure at the right level,” said Kuang Weiping, a surgeon who took part in the operation.
The doctors drained 7.5 liters of fluid from the girl’s head during the operation, a procedure which took four hours on Wednesday.
They left the facial cranium intact as a base in order to secure the titanium mesh, Kuang said.
The surgeons said they divided the mesh into three parts in order to make the implantation process easier and make the mesh more stable.
The surgeons said they used an adult-sized skull implant, since Han Han is still growing. They said the extra scalp tissue can be used to help repair her head as it becomes smaller.
The girl is still in intensive care following her operation.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
