What is "skin grafting" and "reconstructive surgery"?

What is "skin grafting" and "reconstructive surgery"?

As the number one way of removing skin cancer is to cut out the skin which has the abnormal cells in it, the second responsibility of the physician is to bring the skin back together, for both a functional and cosmetic repair. Probably in ninety to ninety-five percent of the cases, that can be done by just bringing the two pieces of skin together adjacent to the tumour, whereby there's a small thin line resultant after the correction of the defect. However, sometimes the defect is so large, or is in such a fragile, anatomic area, that skin cannot be brought directly together in order to repair the defect. There are two other processes, then, that are available to us. One is to use flaps, whereby you take adjacent skin and rotate it in to close the defect. The other is to use grafts, where you take skin, usually from a anatomically similar area, such as behind the ear, etc., put it into the defect, and then have that close the area where the tumour was removed. When possible, an adjacent closure, or a flap closure, is the most cosmetically acceptable. When necessary, a graft would be the next choice. All these things are done by very, very skilled dermatologic surgeons, and actually, the results can be remarkable.