Jerome Hamon becomes the first person in the world to receive two face plants. Hamon has a condition called neurofibromatosis type 1, which can cause skin tumours on the face and elsewhere. In 2010, Hamon’s face was severely disfigured by tumours when he was in his mid-30s. After getting ill in 2015, Hamon was given drugs – antibiotic treatment to fight a cold – that interfered with the anti-rejection medicines he was taking for his face transplant. The antibiotics conflicted with the immunosuppressive treatment he was being given to prevent the face’s rejection, as reported, and last November, the face had to be removed because of necrosis. In a medical first, French surgeon Laurent Lantieri of the Georges Pompidou Hospital in Paris says he has performed a second face transplant on the same patient.

Hamon stayed at the Georges-Pompidou hospital without a face, unable to see, hear or speak until the second transplant took place. Hamon was left without a face, a condition that Professor Lantieri described as ‘the walking dead’. He had no eyelids, no ears, no skin and could not speak or eat. Hamon underwent months of blood treatment before the operation to try to stave off a rejection of the new face. In January, when a second donor face for Hamon became available, Professor Lantieri and his team performed a second face transplant. The donor was 22 years old.

“I’m 43. The donor was 22. So, I’ve become 20 years younger,” Hamon joked on a French television. Few months after receiving his second transplant, he spoke to reporters and affirmed that he was feeling well. “I still have moments when I’m exhausted, but overall I feel well,” he said. Doctors have praised the forthrightness with which he’s faced his difficult medical journal. Anesthetist Bernard Cholley told Agence France-Presse that medical staff were ‘blown away by Jerome’s courage, his will, his strength of character in a tragic situation.’ Cholley said, “While he was waiting he never complained, he was even in a good mood.” Hamon said that he has accepted his new face.

Doctors will wait to see the results of Hamon’s second facial transplant. Other doctors, too, described the procedure as a breakthrough. Plastic surgeon at Cleveland Clinic, Frank Papay told Associated Press, “The fact that Professor Lantieri was able to save this patient gives us hope that other patients can have a backup surgery if necessary.” Professor Lantieri said he and his team would soon publish their findings in a medical journal but he hoped cases like Jerome Hamon would remain the exception.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Apr 18, 2018 09:29 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).