Unless you are a plastic surgeon. When the surgeon Iain Whitaker did a telephone survey of all the sixty-two plastic surgery units across the UK in 2002, 80 percent of the fifty that replied had used leeches postoperatively in the salvage of compromised free flaps or digital replants within the last five years. Three units had used leeches more than sixteen times a year; fifteen had used them up to five times.57 There are abundant leech papers in journals of plastic surgery, maxillofacial surgery, and microsurgery detailing proper leech procedure. Leeches are judged to be effective in the
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