2023-11-10 11:22:09
Updated Friday, November 10, 2023 – 10:22
The transplant, which took place in May, involved a team of more than 140 surgeons and lasted approximately 21 hours.
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A hospital of New York achieved for the first time transplanting a whole eye, half face included, to a 46-year-old patient who had suffered a serious work accident in which he lost his nose, his mouth and his left arm.
The transplant, which It was held in Mayinvolved a team of more than 140 surgeons, nurses and other health workers, and lasted approximately 21 hoursas explained by the institution, NYU Langone Health, in a statement this Thursday.
The patient, Aaron Jamesis an Arkansas veteran who was working as a high-voltage electrician when suffered a brutal accident in 2021, when his face touched a high voltage cable.
Even after undergoing reconstructive operations, James lost “his left eye, his left arm above the elbow, his entire nose and lips, his front teeth, his left cheek, and his chin down to the bone.”the health center detailed in a statement.
During these operations, The surgeons decided to cut the optic nerve as close to the eyeball as possible. so that the patient would have more options in the future, which ended up allowing eye transplantation.
Although for now It is not known whether sight will also be recovered in the transplanted eye.the new organ “has shown extraordinary signs of health, including direct blood flow to the retina,” NYU Langone said.
The operation was directed by the director of the hospital’s Facial Transplant Program, Eduardo Rodriguez, who decided combine the donor’s eye with stem cells derived from their bone marrow.
Is he first attempt to use stem cells in an optic nerve to try to stimulate regeneration. The operation shows that it is possible to perform this type of intervention, but it remains to be seen if it will have positive effects on restoring vision, or only aesthetic ones.
“I feel good”
“I feel good. I still have no movement in it. I still can’t blink. But I already have sensitivity“James told The Associated Press as doctors examined his progress recently.
“You have to start somewhere, there always has to be a first person somewhere,” Jame added. “Maybe it will help the next person.”
Today, cornea transplants – the transparent tissue in front of the eye – are common to treat certain types of vision loss. But transplanting the entire eye – the eyeball, its blood supply and the critical optic nerve that must connect it to the brain – is considered a giant step in the search for a cure for blindness.
Whatever happens, James’s operation offers scientists an unprecedented window into the way the human eye tries to heal itself. “We are not claiming that we are going to restore sight”said Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, chief of plastic surgery at NYU, who led the transplant. “But I have no doubt that we are one step closer.”
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