Fibrin Sealant in Plastic Surgery of the Head

Abstract

For many years fibrin sealant has been widely used in several fields of surgery, as it has proved to be very useful in various surgical situations. The advantages offered by fibrin sealant are: (a) hemostatic effect; (b) adhesive effect; (c) biostimulating action on wound repair.

These characteristics make the use of fibrin sealant particularly useful in the treatment of congenital and acquired pathologies of the head.

In the surgery of soft tissues, the use of fibrin glue allows total adhesion of the cutaneous or myocutaneous flaps to the underlying tissues and also reduces the risk of hematomas and related infections.

Besides these advantages, Tissucol has proved to have a high degree of efficiency in surgery of the skull. It improves bone graft stability, and in skull, jaw and face injuries it can be usefully applied to fractures, especially comminuted fractures, for stabilizing small pieces of bone with a high level of accuracy.

During the past 10 years we have used fibrin sealant in many and various cases as surgical treatment including: secondary deformities resulting from injuries of the face; alveolar cleft and secondary deformities of cleft-lip-palate; cancer of the maxillofacial area; congenital deformities of the face; serious injuries of the head.

From the evaluation of clinical results, we may conclude that there are typical situations in which fibrin sealant has proven to be useful and effective.