Does skull repair affect life expectancy?

The human brain is a very important part, especially some of the structures in the head. However, when brain disease problems occur, surgery is usually used for treatment. The skull is a very important part of the human head, but once a disease occurs and surgery is required on the skull, there will be many side effects after the surgery. The human skull can be repaired, but people usually have some questions. Once the skull is repaired, will it affect people's life and health? Does skull repair affect life expectancy?

In fact, although cranioplasty is a surgery performed on the head, it is not difficult, very safe, and basically has no risk. As long as the perioperative management is done well and complications such as infection do not occur, the patient can resume normal life after skull repair without affecting his lifespan. In particular, Professor Mu Cangshan of the Air Force General Hospital used the latest polyetheretherketone (PEEK) material to perform skull repair surgery, which further ensured the safety of the surgery and the perfect repair of the skull. This material is a special polymer material with high tensile strength and good biocompatibility, and can be fused with the autologous skull. Moreover, the properties of PEEK material are comparable to those of human skull and will not cause any rejection reaction.

Cranioplasty is a common neurosurgery procedure that repairs skull defects caused by brain trauma and craniotomy.

Surgical Procedure

All patients underwent endotracheal intubation and general anesthesia, and underwent covering repair. In the three-dimensional easy-to-shape group, the titanium mesh was cut and manually shaped according to the size and shape of the patient's frontal bone defect to meet the requirements of the patient's defect site as much as possible. The edges were polished smooth and placed in the bone window, and fixed with matching self-tapping titanium nails. Antibiotics were routinely used to prevent infection, the drainage tube was removed after 1 to 2 days, and the stitches were removed after 10 to 12 days.

Efficacy judgment

The patients were observed for wound healing, plastic surgery effects, and complications in the short term after surgery, and the efficacy was finally evaluated according to the following criteria during the follow-up 3 months later. ① Excellent: The titanium alloy mesh is reliably fixed, has a beautiful appearance, and no complications occur after surgery; ② Good: The titanium alloy mesh is reliably fixed, and postoperative complications improve after symptomatic treatment; ③ Poor: The titanium alloy mesh slips and shifts, or the titanium alloy mesh is removed due to other surgical complications.

Data copying precautions

Three-dimensional CT scans should be performed with 1-2 mm scans as much as possible to obtain high-precision data and make the sculpture more accurate. Copying data requires copying the original DICOM data in the CT room to save data processing time. Try not to copy image data between workstations, as this will make the processing more complicated and less accurate. This causes time delays or the shaping cannot be used.

Precautions for children's skull repair

1. Try to follow the doctor's advice and have a secondary sculpture because the child's skull is in the development stage and the skull will continue to grow and change. Since titanium mesh is made of metal and will not grow, it will cause skull asymmetry, affecting appearance and affecting brain development.

2. Try to use three-dimensional titanium mesh because it is softer and has a certain degree of expansion. However, be careful to prevent children from doing too strenuous exercise.