Face Transplant Recipient’s Donor Face Has Been Failing, Doctors Say

A woman who was severely burned in a domestic violence attack recently discovered that tissue damage uncovered by doctors likely will lead to the loss of her donor face. . .

More than 40 patients worldwide have received face transplants, including 15 in the United States. None of the American patients have lost their donor faces, but last year, a French man whose immune system rejected his donor face eight years after his first transplant underwent a second. . .

Tarleton’s doctors noted that most transplanted organs had limited life spans, but her situation has been a reminder that despite successes in the field, face transplantation has been experimental and still a young science with many unanswered questions about benefits versus long-term risks.

Dr. Brian Gastman, a transplant surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic, which performed the first U.S. face transplant 11 years ago, said more patients are starting to experience chronic rejection. “We all believe every patient will likely need a retransplant” at some point, he said.

Since her transplant in February 2013, Tarleton has had repeated rejection episodes when her new face became swollen and red. Those episodes were successfully treated, but last month, physicians discovered that some blood vessels to her face had narrowed and closed, causing facial tissue to die. If the damage progressed slowly, she could go on the waitlist for another donor face. Under the worst-case scenario, the tissue would die quickly, and doctors would have to remove it and reconstruct her original face. (Read more from “Face Transplant Recipient’s Donor Face Has Been Failing, Doctors Say” HERE)

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