
- Max Brambilla
- Plastic Surgery
- Indietro
- Cosmetic Surgery
- Reconstructive Surgery
- Genital Surgery
Per appuntamenti:
+39 3358151911Indirizzi:
Gyplast Medical Institute - Viale Luigi Majno, 18Milano
Clinica Planas - Av. Pere II de Montcada, 16Barcelona
Clinique Champel - Rue Firmin Massot, 12Ginevra
Email:
info@massimilianobrambilla.itI have been to Tanguietà six times, and for the past four years, I have been working as a plastic surgeon in Afagnan. The hugs, the warm welcomes, the tears of the nuns whom I have grown fond of... affectionate greetings that have been repeating for 10 years, affectionate greetings that for 10 years have preceded frenetic activities. Every time it's like this, and I wouldn't want it any other way.

Every time it’s like this, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. From the moment of arrival, work begins. Continuous medical examinations, trucks unloading patients with the red soil of the plateau. Decisions must be made about who to operate on and who not to. It’s not easy.
The operating room in Tanguiétà has two operating tables, which sometimes, out of necessity, seem to multiply like magic. Once, I counted 5 operating tables in action in the same room, with 8 surgeons, 3 scrub nurses, and 3 support staff!
In Afagnan, there are two operating rooms, with 3 operating tables… and the same magic. Operating in Africa is different. The climate is different, the diseases are different, the body’s response is different, and the operating times are different.
Everything changes, and not just due to the precarious conditions. The surgical approach must be modified to solve the problem as quickly as possible, with the fewest number of interventions – the patient is unlikely to return for follow-up – and with the lowest complication rate. What is done in two or more stages, months apart, must be done all at once.
There are also pathologies that, in our context, represent rarity, the “major surgical case.” There, they are routine: enormous vascular malformations, cranial malformations whose real extent you wonder about, tumors the size of cauliflowers…
In Tanguiéta, I used to bite my fingers because radiology couldn’t clarify my understanding of the true extent of strange and bizarre pathologies. Fortunately, in Afagnan, I have been accompanied for two years by a brilliant radiologist with extensive experience in pediatric radiology.
I tell myself: if I don’t do it (or if I don’t dare), what will happen? In a critical situation where you urgently need a vascular or neurosurgeon and there isn’t one available, you have to do it yourself. Either you know how to do it, or you do your best anyway.

I gather my courage and set out.
My anesthetist in Tanguiétà was named Basil. He wasn’t a real anesthetist, not even a doctor; he had no diploma, and he didn’t just put people to sleep. He was also in charge of the pharmacy and the owner of the small bar-dancing that came to life with people on Saturday nights. He had no idea about biochemistry, but he knew that if the blood turned dark, it was a bad sign. All the patients he put to sleep, even malnourished newborns, woke up. And that was good.
My anesthetist in Afagnan is named Isidore. He, too, puts in the maximum effort to face often challenging situations in the best possible way.
Over 10% of the population is HIV positive. So, in the operating room, maximum precautions must be taken to avoid cuts and contact with biological materials. Moreover, you must avoid complications like the plague in a context that seems to revel in promoting them.
But if you leave a complication behind… what a disaster!
In a few days, you have to complete as many surgeries as possible. Every year, I perform about 50 major surgeries, mostly for pediatric malformations. Sometimes I hear people say, “Why bother going, risking a month of vacation from the Hospital, for what?” I laugh, and nostalgia washes over me.
Africa, this Africa (not the sanitized one of safaris, luxurious mega-jeeps, holiday villages) is a crucible of humanity, personal enrichment, sometimes suffering, often great joy.
I’ve had to perform cesarean sections: what an emotion, for a plastic surgeon, to bring a child into the world!
One day, they delivered a truckload of adults with cleft lips, about twenty people. A week later, they left. But all the cleft lips were closed.
These are the real satisfactions of life.

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