Man shows off first US full face transplant

BOSTON—A Texas cherry picker who burned his face off after his head touched an electrical wire showed off his new look Monday as doctors presented the United States’ first full face transplant.

The world’s first full face transplant was unveiled last year by doctors in Spain, a European feat that followed the first partial face transplant in 2005, done on a French woman who had been mauled by a dog.

“I can never express what has been done, what I have been given,” said Dallas Wiens, 26, at a press conference alongside doctors who performed the operation at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the northeastern city of Boston.

Wiens, who lost his left eye in the accident and has no light perception remaining in his right eye, wore black sunglasses and a dark goatee beard, and appeared swollen on one side of his face.

“To me the face feels natural. It feels as it if has become my own,” said Wiens, acknowledging that he still feels numb in some places and needs to continue rehabilitation work to rebuild nerve function.

“There are no words to truly describe the debt of gratitude or love that I possess to the donor family,” he said. The donors have asked to remain anonymous, the hospital said.

Wiens was injured in November 2008 when his head touched a high voltage electrical wire, causing dramatic facial deformities and burning off his nose and lips.

Plastic surgeon Bohdan Pomahac led the team of physicians, nurses and anesthesiologists who worked for more than 15 hours to replace Wiens’s nose, lips, facial skin, nerves and muscles.

“He was quite literally a man without a face,” said Pomahac.

The operation was done in March by a 30-strong team at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, which hailed the first full face transplant performed in the United States as a sign of medical progress.

“In plastic surgery this represents, at least in my mind, a new frontier of reconstructive surgery, of what is possible now,” said one of his doctors, Jeffrey Janis of Parkland Hospital.

“This really opens up an immense amount of doors and represents a lot of hope where maybe before there was none.”

Elof Eriksson, chief of plastic surgery at Brigham Women’s hopsital, said Wiens has been through the first three steps — the initial workup, the surgery and the post-operation healing.

“Dallas has successfully gone through the first three stages but still has to regain nerve and muscle function,” said Eriksson.

Two years ago, doctors at the same hospital performed a partial face transplant on a patient named Jim Maki, “and he can demonstrate functional return after two years,” added Eriksson.

The world’s first full face transplant took place in Spain, and doctors at Vall d’Hebron hospital in Barcelona showed off their work to the public in July 2010.

The 31-year-old recipient, identified as Oscar, was injured in a shooting accident and spoke at a televised news conference with considerable difficulty. He could not close his mouth and his face appeared swollen.

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

Since then about a dozen face transplant operations have been carried out in China, the United States and Spain.

Wiens, who lost his eyesight in the accident, also spoke to reporters with some difficulty, but said he has already begun to regain his sense of smell.

“The first thing I was able to smell was hospital lasagna. You wouldn’t imagine it but it smelled delicious,” he said.

“The ability to breathe through my nose normally, that in itself was a major gift,” he said.

Now he is considering university education and is looking forward to leading a more normal life with his young daughter, who was enamored by his new look.

“She actually said ‘Daddy, you’re so handsome,'” he said.