Microsurgery and its clinical impact.

Microsurgery is a technique of magnifying the visual horizon of the surgeon to enable him to see better, dissect better and perform micro-manipulation. This is to help the surgeon to perform very precise surgery that was not possible in the past. The greatest impact has been in our ability to suture small vessels and to allow us to shift tissues readily from one part of the body to another. It can be considered as a form of "spare part surgery" by using biological tissue consisting of toe, digits, bone, cartilage, skin muscle, intestine and other organs for reconstruction. The techniques are now widely accepted as important techniques in reconstructive surgery. The increasing application of these techniques are now being seen more and more in limb preservation surgery for trauma, tumour resection, congenital abnormality and organ transplant. The potential wide application of the technique in hetero transplant, especially in foetal surgery and foetal tissue transplant is now limited only by immunological rejection.