SKIN TRANSPLANTS

The most successful skin transplant surgery uses skin from an unharmed portion of the body to cover the burned area; this method allows little chance for rejection of the grafted skin.

When there is little skin on the victim's body to be used, one alternative is to use skin grafted from human cadavers or from pigs, whose skin texture is very similar to that of humans. Due to the ever-present problem of rejection, this type of procedure has increased risks. Recently, the use of synthetically-grown human epithelial skin has been used in skin transplantation for burn victims.

Description:
Skin Grafting or Skin Transplanting is a type of medical grafting involving the transplantation of skin. The transplanted tissue is called a skin graft.

Skin grafting is often used to treat:

• Extensive wounding or trauma
• Burns
• Areas of prior infection with extensive skin loss
• Specific surgeries that may require skin grafts for
  healing to occur

Skin grafts are often employed after serious injuries when some of the body's skin is damaged. Surgical removal (excision or debridement) of the damaged skin is followed by skin grafting. The grafting serves two purposes: it can reduce the course of treatment needed (and time in the hospital), and it can improve the function and appearance of the area of the body which receives the skin graft.

When grafts are taken from other animals, they are known as heterografts or xenografts. By definition, they are temporary biologic dressings which the body will reject within days to a few weeks. They are useful in reducing the bacterial concentration of an open wound, as well as reducing fluid loss.

For more extensive tissue loss, a full-thickness skin graft, which includes the entire thickness of the skin, may be necessary. This is often performed for defects of the face and hand where contraction of the graft should be minimized. The general rule is that the thicker the graft, the less the contraction and deformity.

Cell cultured epithelial autograft (CEA) procedures take skin cells from the patient to grow new skin cells in sheets in a laboratory. The new sheets are used as grafts, and because the original skin cells came from the patient, the body does not reject them. Because these grafts are very thin (only a few cell layers thick) they do not stand up to trauma, and the "take" is often less than 100%. Newer grafting procedures combine CEA with a dermal matrix for more support. Research is investigating the possibilities of combining CEA and a dermal matrix in one product.

Courtesy of Wikipedia

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