1st full-face transplant 90% successful
Wed, Jul 07 2010
A Spanish man, who underwent the world's first full-face transplant four months ago, has regained up to 90 percent of his facial function.

The 31-year-old Oscar appeared before TV cameras on Monday for the first time since his surgery where he spoke in a news conference at Barcelona's Vall d'Hebron hospital.

"Friends, I want to thank the hospital coordinators, the entire medical team, the family of the donor and most of all my family who are supporting me these days," BBC quoted him as saying in the news conference.

The Spaniard underwent a 24-hour surgery by a team of 30 experts in late March when doctors lifted an entire face, including jaw, nose, cheekbones, muscles, teeth and eyelids, and placed it masklike onto the man.

According to the surgical team, the surgery was satisfactory as Oscar is able to drink liquids and eat soft foods, and has been able to speak for the past two months. He has also regained feeling in most of his face and is partly recovering movement of his muscles.

Oscar was a farmer who accidentally shot himself in the face five years ago and had been unable to breath, eat, or speak on his own since then.

Dr. Joan Pere Barret, who led the surgical team, announced that Oscar will need between a year and 18 months of physical therapy when he could regain up to 90 percent of his facial functions. Currently, he is discharged from the hospital to go home to his family.

The first successful face transplant was performed in France in 2005 on Isabelle Dinoire, a 38-year-old woman who had been mauled by her dog. 
Copyright Press TV