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Ted Striker
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United States of America
Jan 1970
time: 21:37
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We had another thread on this a few months, ago, but it looks like it's going to go down this time.
People are currently having their faces reconstructed, and often from other parts of their body, often going in for dozens of surgeries to try and get their faces healed after bad accidents, or in one case, when a little boy had his face chewed off by a dog.
quote:
The board's decision didn't have to be unanimous. But in the end, it was.
Surgeons wished they could have done a transplant six years ago, when a 2-year-old boy attacked by a pit bull dog was brought to the University of Texas in Dallas where Dr. Karol Gutowski was training.
Other doctors had tried to reattach part of the boy's mauled face but it didn't take. The Texas surgeons did five skin grafts in a bloody, 28-hour surgery. Muscles from the boy's thigh were moved to around his mouth. Part of his abdomen became the lower part of his face. Two forearm sections became lips and mouth.
"He'll never be normal," said Gutowski, now a reconstructive surgeon at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Surviving such wounds can be "life by 1,000 cuts." Patients endure dozens of operations to graft skin inch-by-inch from their backs, arms, buttocks and legs. Only small amounts can be taken at a time because of bleeding.
Surgeons often return to the same areas every few weeks, reopening old wounds and building up skin. Years later, many patients are still having surgeries. A face transplant -- applying a sheet of skin in one operation -- could be a better solution.
Despite its shock factor, it involves routine microsurgery. One or two pairs of veins and arteries on either side of the face would be connected from the donor tissue to the recipient. About 20 nerve endings would be stitched together to try to restore sensation and movement. Tiny sutures would anchor the new tissue to the recipient's scalp and neck, and areas around the eyes, nose and mouth. |
http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/09/1...t.ap/index.html
Personally, I support this surgery 100%. 
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18-09-2005 23:44
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