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Full Facial Transplant Is One Step Closer
Posted by
timothy
on Sat Aug 23, 2008 06:59 PM
from the get-in-line-for-jolie-lips dept.
from the get-in-line-for-jolie-lips dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "A Chinese medical team led by Shuzhong Guo of the Fourth Military Medical University in Xi'an has successfully completed the first transplant to include facial bone in a transplant on a man whose face was slashed by a bear. The Chinese graft included muscles, nerves, blood vessels, cartilage and skin and included an intact salivary gland, another first. Two years after the procedure, the man can eat, drink and speak, thanks to the gradual fusing of transplanted nerves and muscles with what remained of the patient's own. This transplant together with the another ground breaking transplant last year by French doctors that removed a huge tumor that had completely infiltrated and disfigured their patient's face, now sets the stage for a full facial transplant."
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saw a doco on this (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
This is the next step in disguising the true age of Chinese gymnasts. My prediction: In London, the entire women's team will sport fu manchu mustaches.
Additional information (Score:5, Funny)
The article doesn't mention this; but John Woo was a technical consultant for the Chinese surgical team.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Additional information (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
You have to admire the Chinese... (Score:5, Funny)
They will do ANYTHING to ensure that their underage gymnasts can compete in the Olympics.
London 2012 (Score:1, Offtopic)
Chinese Olympic Gymnast [chinasnippets.com]
Re: (Score:1, Funny)
Yeah, and no more lip-synching needed when the little girl singer's not cute enough -- they'll just swap the faces!
Face/Off (Score:1, Redundant)
Re: (Score:1)
He is going to get a little taller [imdb.com].
Chinese transplant is actually from 2004 (Score:4, Funny)
From the article:
The Chinese team, led by Shuzhong Guo of the Fourth Military Medical University in Xi'an, is the first to include facial bone in a face transplant, carried out on 13 April 2006.
The correct version should read:
The Chinese team, led by Shuzhong Guo of the Fourth Military Medical University in Xi'an, is the first to include facial bone in a face transplant, carried out on 13 April 2004.
Re: (Score:1)
>The Chinese team led by Shuzhong Guo of the Fourth Military Medical University in Xi'an, is the first to include facial bone in a face transplant, carried out 13 April 2006.
Upcoming Breakthroughs (Score:2)
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May I be first in line for a brain transplant?
This is the first intelligent thing I've heard you say, Pinky.
Re: (Score:2)
If there's any sanity in the legal system, you would be the person the brain came from. While hormones from other organs can influence behavior, consciousness and decisions come from the brain, and that's where memories are stored.
So what happens in case of rejection? (Score:1, Insightful)
10 years? (Score:2)
In 10 years most of those cells would already be your own [nytimes.com] for several cell generations.
If there is going to be rejection, that would have to happen much sooner than 10 years.
Donors (Score:4, Interesting)
I wonder how many people would actually be willing to donate their face. It's one thing to donate blood or donate an organ when you die, but to donate part of or the entirety of what makes you most visibly recognizable? Even though the donor would be dead, the family might have issues with disfiguring the corpse.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
>the family might have issues with disfiguring the corpse.
How about spelling this out, early and often:
The members of the family that disrespect the wishes of the decedent, don't get a share of the estate.
Re:Donors (Score:4, Funny)
Take it all after I croak!
When I finally fall over dead I really won't need anything in my body. It would be nice to know that they might do someone else some good once I'm gone.
In fact, if someone does decide to done my face and do a kuku dance... they should date my girlfriend.
Talk about easing the transition!
Parent
Re: (Score:1)
That you look a lot like your skull mitigates the recognizable issues quite a bit.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The face is just a wrapper - a receipient wouldn't have the same bone structure, behavior/expressions (raised eyebrows, winks, scowls), eyes, ways of moving mouth and lips (speech, etc) as the donor.
Remember also that the police do facial reconstruction from bare skulls and get recognisable results - the bone structure is a VERY large part of what makes you look like you do.
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Do Chinese convicts that are executed get a say about being donors?
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They'll just probably roll one of these [usatoday.com] up to the hospital parking lot and volunteer somebody from the passers by if they don't have one already processed.
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Wonder how long after this becomes a relatively safe operation it will be before the first rich but ageing or ugly woman buy the face of a poor but beautiful young woman...
Capitalism über alles.
Re: (Score:2)
Issues?
I'll be dead. Take all you can, especially if it helps other people - I won't need it anymore. Use the remains to teach students at the university, and burn the rest.
Seriously, people who claim their bodies to be holy and untouchable after death are more than just a bit nuts. Would you prefere your body parts to remain useful, or would you rather feed maggots with them?
Face off/Voice off (Score:1)
How about the voice? Can they duplicate the vocal chords too?
Cool (Score:2)
Now all I need is artificial intelligence and plastic personality to go.
More pictures at the BBC (Score:5, Informative)
I was reading about this story this morning. The BBC has more pictures here [bbc.co.uk].
What I found funny is that the caption for the first photo warns, "SOME MAY FIND THE FOLLOWING IMAGES DISTURBING." Personally, I found the first photo - the photo to which that warning is attached - the most disturbing. Yes, more disturbing than the tumor-face.
There's also a photo in there which reminded me of Two-face from The Dark Knight, but it's too blurry to be scary.
Face-off (Score:3, Funny)
In your face, bear!
Bear's response: Ooooooh, Face!
bear/
Think he picked out the new one with FaceBook?
Boy, is his face Red.
Now he'll have to face the truth like he's never faced it before.
Pete Townsend wrote about it (Score:1)
"Face the Face" :D
Fun (Score:5, Funny)
Best thing about a face transplant? Turning up at the donors funeral and making ghost noises.
Re: (Score:2)
Medical and existential (Score:2)
Meh, porn has been doing (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
full facials for years....oh wait, whats that, "full facial transplants", nevermind.
I don't know why you're stopping. You're right both ways!
I was going to submit this. (Score:3, Insightful)
I didn't because I would have felt like a hypocrite. That is probably not the right word, but when I first saw the pictures, I was all like W.T.F?!? I thought the "after" picture was the before picture until I started scrolling though a little bit (I saw this article on a different site that had more photos).
The other site also had the photos featured from this article:
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5il4qlI62UWuVdQ-az7K0N7OvGEoQD92N0TFO1 [google.com]
Again, it was a total W.T.F. moment for me. No, not a Worse Than Failure® moment, but you know what I mean. I got a little introspective after that and decided to leave it alone. Like, what if I saw that guy on the street, would I gasp in horror? Would I stare in amazement? I felt like my submitting it would just be a point and stare opportunity. Please tell me I am not the only one that had this thought.
Re: (Score:2)
Like, what if I saw that guy on the street, would I gasp in horror?
This face transplant story is a complete Shop of Horrors. I was morbidly reading through the stories and the pictures, and got extremely queasy and had to lie down after one of the stories. It was about a woman who woke up to find that her dog had eaten her nose and lips. She didn't realize it at first until she tried to smoke a cigarette.
All part of God's plan, of course.
It's easier for Asians though (Score:5, Funny)
because they all look alike
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No, it is not. There has been research and people of various races are not good at recognising people from another race. For example, westerners will look at hair colour as one of the parameter. Obviously, unless the hair is died, it is not a good parameter for distinguishing oriental people. As it turns out, various races use different sets of parameters to recognise individual people. If you're not trained in that, you'll easily conclude that they look alike. Witness testimonies where a witness is of a di
At last! (Score:2)
Miyagi motion: Face On, Face Off! (Score:2)
Ok, so now we can transplant faces but tell me, Doctor, can we transplant the heart of a good movie into a Travolta vehicle?
a LONG way to go (Score:2)
Seriously, defy your principles and LOOK at the article, there is a picture of the guy after transplant.
How anyone could call a horribly disfigured result 'successful' in a cosmetic procedure is beyond me.
Pretty girls to sing the national anthem (Score:2)
Woohoo! Now they can take the face off the pretty young girl and put it on the ugly little girl that can sing. NO MORE LIP SYNCING!!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Slashdot would greatly benefit from disabling anonymous commenting.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I agree.
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No more drugs for this man!
Re: (Score:2)
It was a (presumably sane) doctor named Robert White, in Ohio.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/1263758.stm [bbc.co.uk]
It was a "success" in the sense that the monkey's head stayed alive and conscious for a few days. The nerves were still severed an
Re: (Score:2)
I really don't see how it's a fist in the face of creationists, even though I'm most certainly not one myself.
Personally, if I have a gripe with the (lack of) logic in an opponent's argument, I don't respond with logicless statements of my own.