Week 5

During week 5, most of surgeries were related with hernia which is a protrusion of tissue or part of an organ below the muscle tissue which cover them. Thus, abdominal hernia patients has bumpy intestinal wall, which makes their abdomen uneven. It can result from various reasons such as overweight, being too skinny, weak abdominal wall, and pregnancy. Even if the reasons are various, most reasons cause higher pressure to the abdominal tissues or organs and press them too much. Or weak abdominal wall is too weak to sustain the organs and tissues properly. That is why the tissue and organ are pressed down and transform to a bulky shape. Thus one of the common methods to correct hernia is covering the bumpy area with flattened mesh. Fascia which is connective tissue covering intestinal well is connected to the mesh and they fascia and mesh play role as a covering layer to the organs and tissues. Usually “Prolene mesh” is widely used and helps pressed-down organs and tissues keep stay and abdomen look flat. However, prolene mesh is synthetic polymer so cells and blood vessels cannot grow on the top. Even if this patient took antibiotics, the blood vessels could not go through the mesh and antibiotics also could not reach to the mesh. Thus, this caused infection. Infected mesh and intestinal well muscle were debrided and muscle or soft tissue graft has to be done. Through this, I re-realized that how important blood supply is for giving nutrients and oxygens for cells as well as deliverying drugs such as antibiotics to prevent infection. Also, blood supply is a key point to eradicate tumor as I am interested in tumor angiogenesis. Here is the point that I can interconnect this clinical experinece and my research. Soft tissue is usually used to replace the defect parts since soft tissue such as adipose tissue is well-known to help angiognesis. Also I have seen interplay of cancer cells and adipose tissue has a synergistic impact on tumor angiogenesis. It was a good time to interconnect my research and clinical experience.