[LordOpie]

FACE TRANSPLANT PLANNED

A 16-year-old Irish girl looks set to receive the world's first face transplant, it has been reported.

In an operation that will make medical history - and cross the boundaries of science fiction - the girl will receive the face of a dead donor.

Lena Marie Murphy suffered horrific facial injuries as a baby when her father's car exploded.

The operation, at London's Royal Free Hospital, will involve peeling away the face of a four-hour-old corpse.

It will then be grafted onto Lena's face, London's Evening Standard reported.

The operation has yet to be approved by a board of ethics, headed by Falklands War veteran Simon Weston, who himself suffered appalling facial injuries during the 1982 campaign.

If given the go-ahead, it is likely to take place within months, the paper reported.
link

another story

 

[valve bouncer]

Hope for you yet Opie

 

[slein]

woah, woah, woah, WOAH!

LO ain't that butt.

















me, on the other hand.... there's a reason i don't have mirrors

 

[$tinkle]

from WGST.com:

November 12, 2003
Atlanta police are investigating the discovery of a body found this morning off Sawtell Road near Jonesboro Road in the Lakewood area. The body was wrapped up and appeared to have been dumped along the side of the road on Norfolk-Southern property. A witness tells 640 WGST that the victim's face appeared to have been cut off, from behind the ears forward.

bummer, no pics

oh, but speaking to your topic, i think this can be exclusively couched in terms of re-constructive/elective surgery. game on!

 

[LordOpie]

Originally posted by valve bouncer
Hope for you yet Opie

lmao you gonna donate your mug?

slein, sorry, I have no idea what you're trying to say

A witness tells 640 WGST that the victim's face appeared to have been cut off, from behind the ears forward.

The problem with the concept is a face is just skin. Once it's on, it'll shape itself to the bones and muscles of the new person, so other than scars, moles and such, it would probably look like the person's own face.

In order for a person to really change their looks to the donor, they'd have to use the bones and muscles too.

 

[DRB]

Not trying to hijack the thread Opie, but this bit of news also from the UK in the medical ethics area.

Just in the last day or so, the practice of choosing the sex of your baby has been ruled out except in the case of gender related medical problems.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/genes/article/0,2763,1082860,00.html

The most distribuing thing, to me, was this leap of logic:

· John Harris, Sir David Alliance professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester, said: "If it isn't wrong to wish for a bonny, bouncing baby girl, why would it be wrong to make use of technology to play fairy godmother?"

 

[slein]

Originally posted by LordOpie
slein, sorry, I have no idea what you're trying to say

that makes two of us....


i wonder what might happen if the surgeon gets confused and screws up the surgery...

.... physician's ****-up ****s-up face

 

[LordOpie]

Originally posted by DRB
Not trying to hijack the thread Opie, but this bit of news also from the UK in the medical ethics area.

no worries...

sex selection is disturbing on multiple levels. One, since there are some people who get sex changes, that suggests that you are who you are regardless of equipment... won't that mean a greater proportion of sex changes in the future or just more people screwed in the head? Two, as a parent -- except in serious medical cases -- how can you fvck with your kid like that?

 

[ohio]

Originally posted by LordOpie
so other than scars, moles and such, it would probably look like the person's own face.

Some scarring can be horribly disfiguring. This is in effect a massive skin graft (not sure if they're also doing cartilage reconstruction at the nose or rebuilding any lost bone... it would depend on the nature of the original injury).

What I'm trying to say is they're not trying to make her look like the now-dead person, or a supermodel. I'm quite certain the goal is to make her look as much like she would have if the accident had not occured. That's also the ethical line for me: this should not be used to make someone look different than they were when they were healthy.