World's First Full Face Transplant Successful

Five years ago a Spanish farmer accidentally shot himself in the face, destroying that part of it below the eye sockets. Strangely, the man retained his eyes and eyesight, but nine surgeries later he could still only receive nourishment through a feeding tube and breathe with the help of a ventilator. He could not speak.

Until Dr. Joan Pere Barret and his team of 30 gave him a new face jaws, teeth, nose, cheekbones, skin, cheeks - in 24 hours, making him Spain's first full-face transplant patient. The operation took place at Vall d'Hebron hospital in Barcelona. The man said to be between the ages of 20 and 40 - now has a completely new face and only one visible scar on his neck, which looks like a wrinkle.

Dr. Barret said the operation was "a little bit like the movie [Face/Off] with John Travolta and Nicolas Cage" where the Cage character's face is grafted onto the Travolta character's skull. The donor's face was cut off beneath the eye sockets and attached to the recipient in one piece.

According to Dr. Barret, the man looked at his face for the first time a week after the operation, and was satisfied with it. He cannot speak, smile or eat yet, but can swallow saliva, is mobile, can see, and is recovering well. He is expected to be in hospital for another two months.

The first partial transplant patient was a French woman in 2005, and since then ten more such operations have been successfully carried out. This one has been hailed as the world's first full face transplant. Doctors are euphoric although there still remains the real risk of rejection, and the patient may have to remain on immune-suppressing medication for the rest of his life to ensure that his body continues to accept his new face.

Having a new facial identity is no small challenge, and the patient had to undergo psychiatric testing prior to the operation to ensure that emotionally he could adequately deal with the consequences of having a completely new and alien face. There have been no photos released of him yet as his identity have been very carefully protected by the hospital and its staff who insist that he be allowed to heal in private.