Surgical wound healing

Abstract

Surgeons usually take wound healing for granted. We assume that after the tumor has been removed and the wound closed the patient will heal the wound within a week or two, and that the tissues will be restored with only a scar and the absence of resected tissues, indicating that an operation has been done. For the most part, wound healing can be taken for granted, and it is unusual for a patient to have difficulty healing a clean, elective operative wound unless there is another condition compromising wound healing. There are a number of known conditions that compromise the ability of a patient to heal a wound, including: excessive trauma to the tissues during surgery, inadequate vascularization of tissues due to preexisting vascular disease or poor flap design, a postoperative wound infection, extreme nutritional deficit, and most importantly for the surgical oncologist, prior irradiation or concomitant chemotherapy.