The president of Ecuador, Guillermo Lasso, will be operated on an eyelid

Guillermo Lasso, president of Ecuador

The secretary general of communication of the Presidency of Ecuador announced in a press release that, next Friday, the head of state, Guillermo Lasso, will undergo a low-complexity surgery for local dissection for a minor injury on the free edge of the lower right eyelid. During this process, the president will continue to carry out his governmental functions.

The Carondelet Communication Secretariat did not provide more details on where the surgery will be performed or the expected recovery time for the head of state, but reiterated that it is a procedure that it does not involve postoperative complications.

A low complexity surgery or minor surgery is a minimally invasive intervention consisting of a series of short surgical procedures that are generally performed on the surface of the human body. They usually require only local anesthesia, and performing them involves little risk to the patient and almost no subsequent medical complications. Therefore, they are small interventions that seek to repair benign wounds or skin changes that, if not treated in time, can worsen. These are procedures that do not require postoperative rehabilitation and are performed in an outpatient setting.

Minor surgery is done to fix problems with simple interventions that are usually short. In fact, they are also carried out in primary care units, health centers and sub-centers of the public health system. It consists of the practice of surgical procedures for the repair of minor injuries suffered by the patient through a brief surgery, in an outpatient clinic and local anesthesia. Minor surgery falls within the professional domain of family medicine. Although these are low-risk procedures, it is important to carry out the correct surgical treatment with complete follow-up, so that there are no subsequent infections.

This is the second time President Guillermo Lasso has received medical care since he took office. Before serving as president, Lasso had to go to the operating room when his spinal column was injured as a result of medical malpractice due to an incorrectly applied injection of epidural anesthesia, after a fall in Spain on March 14, 2013, which fractured his ankle.

After this first surgery, two more operations were carried out: one in Madrid, a few days after the accident, and the second in Cleveland, in the United States, in 2018. Since then, he has attended daily physiotherapy to improve his mobility, which he complements with a cane. Some of the photos of his recovery were published during the 2021 general election campaign. In June 2021, President Lasso entered the operating room a few weeks after taking office as president to undergo a new operation to remedy the damage caused in Spain in the 2013.

Specialists say that no prior preparation is necessary before minor surgery. Since this is an outpatient surgery, the patient could go home once the surgery is done. For this reason, President Lasso does not plan to delegate the exercise of the presidency of Ecuador and will therefore continue to govern during his recovery.

The operation could be a blepharoplasty, a type of surgery performed to correct drooping eyelids or remedy injuries and may involve the removal of excess skin, muscle, and fat. Over time, the eyelids stretch and the muscles that support them weaken. Removing excess tissue from the upper eyelid can improve vision.

In the lower eyelid, the surgeon will make a cut under the eyelid in the shape of the eye tissue or in the lower eyelid . He will remove or redistribute excess fat, muscle, and loose skin, and close the incision.

After the operation, President Lasso is expected to spend time in the recovery room . After a few hours, he is expected to be discharged, which could happen the same day or the next morning so that he can recover in his presidential residence.