A 21-year-old woman severed her left arm during an altercation between relatives. Upon admission, the surgical team was able successfully to reattach the arm after 4 hours of surgery.
The young woman resides in Erabadupitiya, Kegalle, and is a worker at the Polgahawela Garment factory.
The day before yesterday (6) around 7.30 pm a quarrel between the relatives of the patient’s family turned violent, leading one of them to use a sword to cut off the woman’s left arm. The family members acted fast and took her to the Kegalle General Hospital in 15 minutes, along with the severed arm in a bag with ice.
The specialist surgeon who performed the surgery, Dr. Ananda Jayawardena gave a statement regarding the incident that took place.
“In cases like this, we focus on two main things. The first is to make sure the patient’s life is no longer in danger. Second, to focus on reattaching the severed limb.
By the time she was hospitalized, she had already lost a lot of blood. So her life was in danger. However, once we successfully did a blood transfusion, we were able to stabilise her condition. Afterwards, after four hours of surgery, we were able to reattach her severed limb.
In addition, I should point out that everyone on the surgical team—including the assistant doctors and surgeons, anaesthetist, nurses, health assistants, and blood bank—made an enormous contribution to the success of the procedure.”
The patient is currently in the Intensive Care Unit of the Kegalle General Hospital and is recovering.
