Spiral Needles for General and Plastic Surgery
Spiral Needles find application in wound-healing and plastic surgery. Various designs are used for cosmetic wound closure or alternative uses such as skin lifting or Liposuction. The spiral needle is GeneRally designed as a hollow needle with a corkscrew turn. Inside the needle runs a surgical thread, usually with an absorbable tip. Depending on the application (e.g., muscles, sub layer or fatty layer) there are different shapes available, differing in diameter, inner thickness or size of the threading hole. The spiral needle can be twisted to the right or to the left - depending on which direction is being sutured.
General Use
As wound tissue heals fastest when related wound layers lie against each other without any tension, larger wounds are usually sutured. Typically, the surgeon threads through the tissue on both sides of the wound and knots the thread. Long wounds inevitably contain multiple knots. These are often not cosmetically satisfying. More cosmetically appealing is a suture that runs only intra- or subcutaneously. However, these sutures require great surgical skill and are possible only for easily accessible wounds. The Spiral Needle allows wounds to be sutured easily, even in less accessible areas.
General Surgery
In General Surgery the Spiral Needle for wound closure is designed as a hollow needle holding the surgical thread. The thread terminates in a tip, facilitating the puncture while suturing. If the tip and the thread are made of absorbable material, they will not need surgical removal. The Spiral Needle is used in combination with a thermal exchange treatment of the tissue treated. To ensure that no gap stays between the cut - off canal and the remaining thread and no blood from the vessels emerges at canal level, as well as to optimize tissue cohesion the suture area needs to be frozen at the beginning of the procedure. This causes a tissue expansion due to the larger mass of tissue fluid. The tissue is then reheated causing a contraction of the capillary and of the connective tissue in the [...] area, – the suture has a better grip. The thermal exchange treatment can be repeated if necessary. Tendons and muscles, vessels and nerves are sutured more accurately and faster than with conventional means.
Also muscle fiber ruptures can be treated by suturing the rupture across and along the direction of the muscle.
Plastic Surgery
The Spiral Needle allows a unique technique for skin lifting - conventional surgical intervention or [...] injections (i.e. Botulinum Toxin A or fillers) should no longer be required.
Skin Lift
The Spiral Needle is in this case inserted with its thread through the lower and middle layers of the skin through to the muscle layer. Once in touch with the Spiral Needle, the subcutaneous layer and the muscles touching the spiral needle at tendon level, roll up slightly. On the other side of the lifting area, the spiral needle is gently taken out of the skin, without picking up the thread. The two ends of the thread are to be hold by the surgeon. If the thread tip is absorbable, it shape will allow it to stays in the skin or on the skin surface. The surgeon will now pull on both sides of the thread and the subcutaneous tissue crossed by the thread will pull the tendons together. The skin will thus tighten for a very long period as the lasting thread will be incorporated by the tissue. Depending on the thickness of the lifting area, different diameters can be used. By choosing the correct diameter and optimizing the depth at which the treatment is performed, the surgeon can determine the tightness of the lift by working on the respective height and length.
Special Use
Liposuction
In addition to Spiral Needles for wound closure, a special Spiral Needle has been developed for liposuction use. For this purpose, the Spiral Needle is equipped with cavities allowing the absorption and removal of dead fat tissue. The needle can be heated and cooled via its handle. When the surgeon inserts the needle into the fat tissue, the temperature transfers to the tissue - the thermal exchange leads to the destruction of the fat cells while the needle cavities adsorb the same removing them easily after treatment.
See also
- Cosmetic surgery
- Minimal access cranial suspension
- Oral and maxillofacial surgery
- Otolaryngology
- Plastic surgery
- Surgical_suture