Current concepts and future challenges in facial transplantation.
Facial allotransplantation has become a surgical reality. The first successful segmental human face transplants have demonstrated that facial allografts are reliable, their rejection can be prevented by low-dose immunosuppression, and their neurologic recovery enables oral and expressive functions of the face to be restored. Clinical facts have shown that the risk-benefit balance is acceptable in the medium term, that at the neurocognitive level the allograft is reintegrated in the body scheme of the recipient, and that it does not engender a donor identity transfer. This article presents a classification of facial allografts and discusses the technical, immunologic, and ethical challenges that lie ahead.
Lengelé
Benoît G
BG
Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Cliniques Universitaires Saint-Luc, Avenue Hippocrate, 10, B-1200, Brussels, Belgium. benoit.lengele@uclouvain.be
D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D005145:Face / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D054445:Facial Transplantation / Q000191:economics / Q000941:ethics / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D005544:Forecasting; D006084:Graft Rejection; D006085:Graft Survival; D006801:Humans; D020127:Recovery of Function; D014184:Transplantation, Homologous / Q000276:immunology