Editorial for March 2023 Volume 6, Issue 3
We all heal well with a little bit of help.
Assistance or support at the right time can do wonders for us. Unsurprisingly, nature works the same way. Everything in nature is interdependent in a way that the cycle of life and sustainability keeps going. Sometimes, Man’s intervention has helped diseased plants to be cured and injured trees to live longer, simply by use of ‘grafts’. As everything in nature, Man applied the same principles in healthcare, and ‘grafts’ have been used in medical and dental sciences to help in faster healing and better health. Let us see how!
Grafts in Nature
In horticulture, grafts are used for joining together plant parts by means of tissue regeneration. Grafting is the act of placing a portion of one plant (bud or scion) into or on a stem, root, or branch of another (stock) in such a way that a union will be formed and the partners will continue to grow. (1)
The part of the combination that provides the root is called the stock; the added piece is called the scion. When more than two parts are involved, the middle piece is called the interstock. When the scion consists of a single bud, the process is called budding.
In plants, grafting and budding are the most widely used vegetative propagation methods. Simply put, grafting in nature is the act of joining two plants together.
Plant grafting is used for a variety of purposes (1)
- to repair injured trees
- to produce dwarf trees and shrubs
- to strengthen plants’ resistance to certain diseases
- to retain varietal characteristics
- to adapt varieties to adverse soil or climatic conditions
- to ensure pollination
- to produce multifruited or multiflowered plants
- to propagate certain species (such as hybrid roses) that can be propagated in no other way.
Grafts in Medicine
In medicine, grafting is obtaining healthy skin, bone, or other tissue from one part of the body and using it to replace diseased or injured tissue from another part of the body. Surgeons insert a new piece of tissue in the place where the same type of tissue needs to heal or join.(2)
Types of grafts in medicine:
- Skin Grafts - When skin damage is too big to treat with stitches, grafts can help. The injured skin is removed and replaced with a healthy patch, usually from somewhere else on the body, like an arm or leg. Over days or weeks, it heals together with the surrounding skin. (2) Skin grafting is done in skin damaged due to -
- Burns
- Injuries/accidents/trauma
- Surgery.
- Ligament Grafts - Ligaments are tough bands of tissue that hold bones or cartilage together. But when they tear, they may not heal. Doctors routinely treat ligament tears like torn ACLs (anterior cruciate ligament) in the knee, by grafting on a healthy tendon to replace it.
- Vascular Grafts (like coronary bypass) - If one of the arteries in the heart is blocked or dangerously narrowed, treatment advised is a coronary artery bypass graft. It can be done via two types of grafting:
- Surgeons remove a vein (often from the leg) and attaches it to the artery on either side of the problem area. This is a bypass.
- Surgeons reconnect one end of an artery (usually from the chest) directly to the heart.
Doctors can use similar strategies with blocked or narrowed arteries in other areas of the body
- Bone Grafts - Doctors can treat damaged bone with a graft of healthy bone, usually taken from the pelvic bone. More recently, they use injections of bone marrow instead. Once it’s in place, the bone grows and heals. Bone grafts generally are used in:
Free for members
Keep reading — it's free
The rest of this article is open to DentalReach members. Create a free account, or sign in, and every article on the site opens in full.
