Tshifularo conducted the surgery on Wednesday on a 35-year-old man at the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Pretoria.
Following the historic procedure, Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi vowed to do everything to assist and mobilise resources for the far-reaching innovation.South African surgeons have successfully performed the world's first transplant of middle-ear bones that uses 3-D printed components, a research university said.
The technique"may be the answer to conductive hearing loss - a middle ear problem caused by congenital birth defects, infection, trauma or metabolic diseases," Pretoria University said in a statement seen Thursday. The surgery replaced the hammer, anvil and stirrup - the smallest bones in the body which make up the middle ear - with similarly-shaped titanium pieces produced on a 3-D printer.
"3-D technology is allowing us to do things we never thought we could," said University of Pretoria health faculty professor Mashudu Tshifularo.
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