Reconstructive surgery is a branch of plastic surgery. Its primary purpose is to correct congenital malformations; being the latter anomalities in the shape or structure of a part of the body already present at the fertilisation moment, when sperm joins the ovum and creates the first cell. Usually, they are not common; (for example, only one out of 300 newborns suffers from heart disease) and the extension of these abnormalities is heterogeneous, in relation both to severity and etiology.

A disease diagnosis is possible even before birth (Down syndrome), or immediately after (for example, hearing impairments).

The causes of congenital malformations are genetic and environmental; it was calculated that 10% of these pathologies derives from genetic-chromosomal problems while another 10% is due to exogenous factors and the remaining 80% is caused by concurrent factors.

Recently, being a public health issue with high social impact, congenital malformations have played a major role in the socio-healthcare field. Indeed, thanks to the amazing progress in medical science in recent years, it has been possible to find satisfactory solutions to different types of diseases (such as, for example, those of infectious nature), while congenital pathologies, having genetic causes mostly still unknown, remain a large area yet to be explored.