Picture this scenario: You and your loved ones are sitting around having a heart-to-heart chat about deep issues, when suddenly one of your parents or a friend says, "When I die, I plan on donating my face."
Huh? Now, thanks - or not - to the world's amazing and advanced technologies in modern medicine, this conversation could very well become a reality.
It began with the first-ever partial face transplant, performed on a 38-year-old French woman on Nov. 27 - medical experts and a newly released photo of the patient post-operation deem this practice a triumph for medicine. But the controversies and risks abound, leaving individuals to wonder if modern medicine has, indeed, gone too far.
While doctors have said the technology to perform such an operation has been around for more than 10 years, they have only recently found success with the immunosuppression drugs patients must take for the duration of their lives. While the drugs have been shown to work in cases of limb transplant and even larynx transplant, they still have many risks. The drugs' main risks include failure to control rejection of the donated facial tissues and the increased, long-term possibility of cancer.
Nothing comes close to the issues associated with the transplant itself, however, and plenty of people - doctors included - have something to say about it. The first issue to consider is the acquiring of facial tissue to use during the transplant. How does a family make such an ethical decision of whether or not to donate their loved one's face? It is one thing to donate internal organs, but it is quite another to donate facial tissue and require a closed casket or cremation for the deceased.
Then there is the concern that bears heavily on the minds of family and friends of the deceased person - will the recipient of the transplant bear resemblance to the donor?
Doctors report the patient does not look identical to the donor because of variances in bone and muscle structure and other features, but some similarities can still be observed between the donor and the new recipient. For the donor's family, this could cause lasting psychological distress in knowing their loved one's face is now on another person somewhere in the world.
Still, the psychological effects of the transplant would impose their greatest burden on the recipient of the facial tissue. While it may be emotionally uncomfortable to know you are carrying a bodily organ - such as a heart or kidney - that was once inside another person's body, the emotional disturbance could be beyond overwhelming when you are wearing the face of a deceased person.
Although it would be difficult to endure society's attitudes and stares toward a face covered with burns, scars or deformities, I could not imagine accepting the risks and constant disconcerting thoughts of receiving a donor's face. The worries would plague me: whether or not I could claim "ownership" of my face when someone else had it before me, how the donor's family is coping with the donation and transplant, the persistent possibility of my body rejecting the tissue and the tissue turning black and, most importantly, society's new attitudes and stares once they discover how I have ethically, morally and medically challenged the natural law.
So, although it is wonderful doctors are trying to create better lives for those who have suffered tragic facial injuries, perhaps medical advances could be made elsewhere in trying to restore patients' quality of life. Further advancement in areas such as reconstructive surgery or skin grafting would be ethically accepted and would not likely be psychologically or emotionally damaging to the patient. Also, with no need for facial tissue donors, families and living donors would never have to tackle a decision that generates so many emotional, ethical and, for the recipient, health-related risks.
Write to Danielle at drcoulter@bsu.edu
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