Marilyn Thipthorpe
15 years ago, in 2001, valiant firefighter Patrick Hardison, lost his face when battling a fire in Mississippi. The roof of the house collapsed on him, and he was buried underneath, by the time he was rescued most of his body was burnt and his face was completely disfigured beyond recognition. He had hoped long and hard to get a face transplant and had undergone over 70 surgeries to the point but none satisfied him. This included his ears, eyelids and more. Face transplants have been tried many times over the years but none had involved replacing as much tissue as this one, in fact one which came as close to this one resulted in the death of the patient. Doctor Eduardo Rodriguez, chairperson of the Wyss Department of Plastic Surgery at NYU Langone, performed the 26 hour surgery on Patrick Hardison. The surgery was undertaken by more than 100 surgical staff for duration of 26 hours in an attempt to replace Patrick’s entire face with the donor face of David Rodebaugh. The doctors removed the donor’s entire scalp including his eyelids, ears, veins, forehead and even some bone and muscle this was then attached to Patrick’s scalp inch by inch, vein by vein and nerve by nerve till everything was in its perfect position.