Cape Town - Within 20 hours of a teen’s left hand being almost completely hacked off with a panga in Claremont, leaving it connected to his body by just five millimetres of skin, the limb was successfully reattached.
Two gruelling and intricate surgeries were performed on Zander Vermeulen, 19, shortly after the attack, which occurred about two weeks ago as he was walking from a club in Claremont to his nearby flat about 3am.
This week one of the doctors who helped reattach his hand, Dr Kevin Adams, 48, told Weekend Argus how a quickly assembled team at Life Kingsbury Hospital in Claremont managed to reattach Vermeulen’s hand.
Bones, arteries, veins and nerves had to be painstakingly reconnected in two separate procedures totalling nine hours.
“It’s the kind of operation we don’t do very often…
“At this point in time, if we end up with a hand that’s still alive, that can feel hot and cold, then it’s better than an artificial hand,” the doctor told Weekend Argus.
During the next three to nine months it would become apparent how much sensation Vermeulen would regain in the injured hand.
The horror attack took place when a car pulled up next to Vermeulen as he walked home, on the corner of Bowwood and Foyle roads in Claremont.
The occupants pretended to ask for directions to an ATM.
After giving them directions, one of the occupants sprang from the car with a panga, chopping off Vermeulen’s hand as he tried to defend himself.
The teen fled, managing to get help from his flatmates, all the time holding his injured left hand with his right.
No arrests have yet been made.
This week Adams said that on the morning of the attack, a Friday, he had received a call at 3.08am from a doctor on duty at Kingsbury.
“Within 60 seconds of looking at Zander’s injuries (that doctor) picked up the phone and called. He said: ‘Don’t ask questions, just come’.”
By 3.30am Adams had assessed Vermeulen in the emergency room.
“As soon as the anaesthetist arrived and was about to put him to sleep, a Claremont police officer arrived to take his statement.”
Vermeulen managed to tell police what had happened to him before the first of two operations.
Adams said the force of blow had driven the panga through all Vermeulen’s wrist bones.
The first operation started at 3.30am and ended at 7.30am.
“In that operation we reconnected all the bones. Once the bones were connected we reconnected the arteries and veins to make sure blood was getting into the hand again,” Adams said.
After the operation Vermeulen was stabilised in the intensive care unit.
At 6pm he was again wheeled into the operating theatre for the next procedure, which continued until 11pm.
“We reconnected the nerves to give feeling in the hand and the tendons to allow the fingers to bend and strengthen,” Adams said.
He said he had dealt with a similar case about five years ago when a worker’s hand was chopped off on a conveyor belt.
That incident had been different in that 14 hours had lapsed between the accident and when doctors operated. In Vermeulen’s case, only about 90 minutes had lapsed.
“(In the previous incident), the hand started dying after two to three weeks. He ended up losing the hand completely,” Adams said.
But he believed Vermeulen was lucky in that the attack occurred close to the hospital.
“If Zander had been at Groote Schuur Hospital, I doubt he would have been treated so quickly because they’re very busy.”
When he had checked on Vermeulen this week, the doctor said, the teen was doing well and his reattached hand appeared to be in good condition. “It’s looking fantastic for now,” Adams said.
He said he had also approached other doctors to ask their opinion about whether Vermeulen would have to undergo further operations, but was told that this was unlikely.
“It looks like the hand is going to be fine,” he said.
During the next week a specialist hand physiotherapist would start working with Vermeulen. It would then take several months to determine how much function and sensation the hand would regain.
Weekend Argus