[Plastic surgery in the tension field of surgery]

The 70th birthday of Professor Kraft-Kinz, who holds the Chair of Surgery at the University of Graz, is a suitable occasion to review the development of several surgical disciplines into independent specialist fields. Plastic surgery is one such monospecialty which has been in existence as a separate entity for the past 7 years. Important personalities and events in surgery are traced back to the 18th century and described from an Austrian perspective, with particular reference to the University of Graz. The process of achieving independence since 1988, in conjunction with the application of new techniques, in particular microsurgery, has led to enormous expansion of this specialty, both regarding quantity and quality of practice. Hence, the initial divergence has changed to an overlapping convergence of the specialties and the current interdisciplinary cooperation is of great benefit to all the individual subspecialist fields. This is illustrated by means of case reports representing two distinct areas of exemplary interdisciplinary interaction in surgical management.