For ISM this past week, I had a mentor visit where I had the opportunity to view a surgery. The surgery was something extremely different from what I was used to witnessing and was performed on a man who was older than the typical patient I observe in Dr. Cain’s office. The patient was an older man who wanted to remove the excess skin that was prevalent under his chin area and on his neck. As the man aged, the skin around his neck began to sag as part of the natural aging process and developed into something that the man wanted to remove. As a result, Dr. Cain performed what’s known as a cervicoplasty or a platysmaplasty which is also known as a neck lift.
When observing Dr. Cain in the operating room, I saw that he was utilizing a unique method in suturing the patient. I asked Dr. Cain the method he was using and he was utilizing a combination of an O to Z and O to T flap in order to close the skin so that the neck, scar, and remaining skin would heal properly and not create unnecessary stretches and tension on the neck area that would cause discomfort for the patient. The middle of the incision had a suturing technique that resembled a Z pattern and Dr. Cain discussed with me how he describes it as a Z plasty and that a Z-plasty is utilized in order to easily camouflage the scar due to the fact that it is not a straight line vertically down the neck. He mentioned how Z-plasty allows for adequate scar revision through the release of tension that it allows on the skin and on the incision area.
Overall, viewing this surgery allowed me to view a different facet of the facial plastic surgery field. Through learning about new suturing methods, I will be able to better apply those scar revision techniques in other areas of facial plastic surgery in order to better understand and describe different procedures that will further expand my knowledge in the field.