"The bones are gone, it's soft!"
The person who said this was a 2-year-old child, he was very smart, he knew that his left thumb was not good, and as soon as he came in, he took the initiative to stretch out his little hand for me to see, and he was not afraid of strangers, and his big bright eyes looked at me.
Mom said that this child is indeed very sensible, but he often points to his thumb and says, "How is it soft?", which makes people feel distressed, so Mom and Dad thought that they must help him change.
The baby's left thumb is a type IV thumb dysplasia, also known as floating thumb, due to the lack of thumb function, the baby can only rely on the fingers to clamp things, and because of dysplasia, the joints are very unstable, more prone to injury, so parents are also more anxious, want to complete the operation for the child before he goes to school.
How is the child operated on the floating thumb?
The first is to do the thumb of the index finger. This is the traditional method of doing a floating thumb in the past, which is to cut off the stunted floating thumb directly, and then make the index finger function as a thumb for surgery.
The second is to do a hemimetatarsal reconstruction. It is to take a part of the bone from the metatarsal bones of the foot to build a skeleton.
The third is to do a hemimetacarpal graft reconstruction. Take the second metacarpal bone directly near the affected area and reconstruct the first metacarpal bone.
"Then you can't cut your fingers, does this have any effect on your feet after taking bones from your feet?"
After listening to the surgical plan, the parents were more concerned about whether there was an impact on the child's feet, and I told her that if the semi-metatarsal reconstruction was done, the child's feet would not be able to bear weight for about 3 months.
In fact, the parents also had some understanding of the surgical method before they came, and after thinking about it, they finally chose the semimetacarpal bone graft reconstruction surgery, because it can save the child's five fingers and not let the child be injured on the foot.
What do I need to pay attention to after the floating thumb surgery?
Parents are more worried about their children's post-operative care and want to know what to pay attention to.
In fact, the most important thing after surgery is to keep up with functional exercises.
The child's finger grasping function can be trained, and thumb-oriented movements such as grasping toys and holding a pen can also be done, but this requires parents and children to work together to complete the postoperative functional exercise.
I touched the child's head, this little baby is very well-behaved, I believe that he can cooperate well with the postoperative functional exercise, looking forward to his good news.
The operation went very smoothly, successfully preserved the baby's five fingers, five months after the operation, the parents shared with me the video of the child's bean grasping exercise, you can see that the baby's grasping ability is now exercising well, you can pinch the beans and catch the ball, the baby is more confident!