Maybe you think plastic surgery is a luxury or something you enjoy.
What if I told you you were wrong?
Research shows that the history of plastic surgery dates back a long time. For example, the roots of cosmetic and reconstructive procedures date back more than 2,500 years. In addition, developments following the recent world wars also contributed to the advancement of plastic surgery.
Surgical interventions, especially for the treatment of soldiers injured in war and their return to life, such as facial aesthetics or the stitching of severed limbs, have led to important developments in reconstructive surgery.
Plastic surgery has thus advanced very rapidly. By the way, I have to say right away; the ‘plastic’ in ‘plastic surgery’ actually comes from the Greek word ‘plastikos’, which means ‘to mold’ or ‘to shape’. So if you think the word plastic means something unnatural, you are wrong again. In the 6th century BC, Indian physician Sushruta was considered the ‘father of surgery’.
Because he wrote a book that is considered one of the oldest medical and surgical works in the world. The ‘Samhita’ written by Sushruta includes
hundreds of diseases, different uses of medicinal herbs and of course surgeries.
This book, which has contributed to the advancement of medical technology since the day it was written, is the first known scientific review.
But more importantly, the explanation of skin transplantation is also included in this book. Long live medicine!
Sushruta discovered and used techniques that enlightened plastic surgery, such as transplanting a portion of skin to another location, in his surgeries. This book is considered the ancestor of the techniques we still use.
However, the reasons for performing these surgeries were of course different at that time. Nowadays, reconstructing a nose is usually done to solve health and aesthetic problems. At that time, this type of nose surgery was usually performed on patients whose noses were deformed as punishment for theft or adultery.
Nowadays, medicine has advanced a lot. Now, we surgeons still use skin grafts to restore areas that have lost their protective tissue layer due to trauma, infection, and burns caused by various reasons. In this way, we treat the areas created by skin loss.
Surprisingly, all these techniques are included in the Sushruta Samhita, written thousands of years ago. Long live medicine!
