From: http://www.nando.net/newsroom/ntn/health/121098/health6_2009.html
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World's first hand transplant regains sense of touch
Copyright © 1998 Nando Media
Copyright © 1998 Reuters News Service
LYON, France (December 10, 1998 11:45 a.m. EST http://www.nandotimes.com) - Three months after receiving the world's first hand transplant, the recipient said Thursday that the sense of touch had returned to his fingers and he could move his grafted hand reasonably well.
Australian businessman Clint Hallam, who received a brain-dead man's right hand to replace the one he lost in a circular saw accident in 1989, told a news conference he was convinced he would eventually gain full use of the transplant.
His doctor, Professor Jean-Michel Dubernard, said Hallam's body was adjusting well to the new hand and that he could return to his native Perth before or shortly after Christmas.
"The progress made is really quite staggering," Hallam told journalists.
"Sensation is just starting to arrive in the fingertips. The strength within the muscles is still a little restricted, but it is certainly regaining the normal strength of my hand," he said.
An international team of doctors sewed the hand onto the stump of Hallam's right arm on Sept. 23 in a 3-1/2 hour operation at the Edouard Herriot hospital in Lyon in central France.
The medical team of six doctors, which included international experts in microsurgery, orthopedics and transplant surgery, was led by Dubernard of Lyon and Dr Earl Owen of Sydney, Australia.
The procedure involved attaching the bone of the donated hand and forearm to Hallam's forearm. Afterwards doctors painstakingly sutured together the blood vessels, nerves, tendons, muscles and skin.
dan@southeast.net
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