Surgery – Instruments – Means for removal of skin or material therefrom
Patent
1996-10-23
1998-07-21
Thaler, Michael H.
Surgery
Instruments
Means for removal of skin or material therefrom
606187, A61B 1734
Patent
active
057828431
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to equipment for the mechanical implanting of hair roots in skin, particularly in the head region, for use when performing transplant surgery.
There already exist several methods for making hair transplants for repair of beginning and advanced baldness, particularly with male persons, by collecting hair roots from the patient's own ear and neck areas and implanting them by hand on the bald head area. The two most common methods today include a first method where round skin patches with hair roots, so-called grafts, are collected from the ear and/or neck area. This is operation is often made by means of a cylindrical drill rod driven by a drill machine, Corresponding holes are stamped out by hand power or by using a laser in the bald area, and the transplants (the grafts) are put in place by hand, one by one.
A second method is a somewhat larger surgical operation. A larger apportioned piece of skin is cut out from the ear
eck area by means of a scalpel. The skin piece is typically elongate in shape, and taken from a neck/head area where hair growth will normally continue the whole lifetime. The skin piece is cut out in such a shape that the pulling together and sewing together of the surrounding skin will remain invisible beneath the remaining neck hair. The skin piece which has been taken out can be divided in such a manner that single hair roots or possibly larger units, i.e. grafts, can be used for implantation. The hair roots or the units can be placed in the bald head area by making small incisions with a knife, so as to split the skin, then the hair root or graft is put into place, and thereafter the skin is squeezed together again. Optionally one utilizes metal pins which are stuck into the skin. When these pins are removed thereafter, the hair roots are placed into the cavities left by the metal pins.
Both of the methods mentioned above are detailed and time-consuming.
Different types of equipment for use in such implanting operations are known, and in this connection reference is made to British patent no. 1,553,950. This publication shows a device for the mechanical implanting of hair elements where the hair is held in a tubular inner needle which at a rounded end thereof is slideably disposed within an outer needle which is rigidly secured. In the patent the outer needle is constructed in different manners, inter alia as a split-injection type, and in this case comprises a couple of arcuate knife points which are spring biased into mutual engagement at their relatively sharp and mutually supporting ends. The mode of operation is that the outer needle cuts into the skin, and then the inner needle holding the hair element to be implanted follows down into the cavity made by the outer needle. When the outer needle is pulled back, the inner needle remains standing in the skin to hold the hair element, and the inner needle is pulled out last, while the hair element is then held by the skin which collapses around the hair element. When the outer needle is of the split-injection type, the knives are split apart after having entered the skin in order that the inner needle may advance in between the two sharp knives, which are thereafter retracted.
However, the above mentioned GB 1,553,950 relates to implanting hair elements without hair roots, i.e. instead of using real hair roots, which roots will continue generating new hair in a normal manner, one implants hair by simply making a loop in the lower part, and one then hopes that this loop shall get a foothold in the skin, and further it is hoped that the hair element shall last as long as possible. Such an implanting operation is in principle quite inferior when compared to a transplantation of a hair root which will provide genuine hair growth in the years to come. Also, the previous publications mentioned in GB 1,553,950 relate to techniques of implanting hair elements, not hair roots. Nevertheless, in the present invention a technique is used which is similar to the technique used in GB 1,5
REFERENCES:
patent: 3596292 (1971-08-01), Erb
patent: 5269801 (1993-12-01), Shiau
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