HEALTH
N.Y.U. face-transplant patient faces the public
BY SYDNEY PEREIRA
More than 11 months after a 25-
hour operation that gave him
a new face, Cameron Underwood
spoke publicly for the fi rst time
about the cutting-edge surgery.
“Thank you for not giving up on me,”
Underwood told his supporters and
families on Thurs., Nov. 29. “It hasn’t
been easy, but it has been worth it.”
As Underwood, 26, spoke, standing
alongside him was the doctor who led
the grueling operation, Eduardo Rodriguez,
chairperson of N.Y.U. Langone
Health’s Hansjörg Wyss Department of
Plastic Surgery.
Two-and-a-half years ago, Underwood
suffered a self-infl icted gunshot
wound to his face, leaving him with
major diffi culties eating, breathing and
speaking.
Mental health struggles drove him
to attempt suicide — but his mother,
Beverly Bailey-Potter, refused to give
up. She happened to read a magazine
article about the fi rst face transplant
Rodriguez had performed and immediately
contacted him in hopes of giving
her son a second chance at life.
Within 18 months — a record time in
the U.S. — doctors identifi ed a donor
through LiveOnNY, an organ-recovery
organization. The donor was William
Fisher, a 23-year-old Manhattanite who
died last year.
Fisher’s mother, Sally, said in a statement,
“I don’t think I would have survived
Will’s death if not for Cameron.
Cameron has his whole life ahead of
him — and I love the idea that Willie is
helping him have a better life.”
Just more than 40 face transplants
have been performed worldwide since
the fi rst one in 2005, according to
N.Y.U. Langone. Rodriguez and his
100-person-team reached unprecedented
milestones in their second face
transplant. For one, Underwood’s surgery
was partly covered by a private insurer
through his employer, which Rodriguez
said is critical in making such
operations the standard of care.
Underwood’s surgery involved a
combination of reconstruction and
transplantation on his upper and lower
jaw, all 32 teeth and gums, the roof and
fl oor of his mouth, lower eyelids and
cheeks, plus his nose and sections of
the nasal passage.
“It’s a very complex procedure,” Rodriguez
explained. “The timing of that
is incredibly crucial.”
Fisher donated several different organs
in addition to his face. Two teams
of operating rooms worked side by side
for more than a day to procure Fisher’s
Cameron Underwood with Sally Fisher, the mother of the donor whose
face is now Underwood’s.
heart, liver, kidneys, eyes and other tissues
for research purposes.
But just days after Fisher’s death,
when Underwood was readying to fl y
PHOTOS BY SYDNEY PEREIRA
crosscountry for his face transplant
surgery, the infamous “bomb cyclone”
snowstorm struck New York, canceling
his commercial fl ight. But volunteer pilots
Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, right,
spoke about the operation as
photos of Cameron Underwood —
from left, before his self-inflicted
injury, after the injury and after
the surgery — were shown.
that the hospital works with were
able to fl y Underwood to the city in the
“nick of time,” Rodriguez said.
“If they would’ve been stuck in
the storm, Cameron would not have
received his transplant,” the doctor
said.
His recovery was speedier than the
fi rst face transplant operation that Rodriguez
performed. Underwood spent
37 days in the hospital compared to 62
days with Rodriguez’s previous patient.
Time in the intensive-care unit and
rehabilitation was more than halved,
from 51 to 23 days and 13 to 7 days,
respectively.
“I guess the easy way to explain it
would be being like a newborn,” Underwood
said of his recovery. “How to
position your tongue and your lips and
all of that — and you forget how diffi
cult that is. You have to really learn it
all over again.”
Rodriguez hopes Underwood’s story
encourages people to sign up to be an
organ donor.
“When we’re gone from this material
world and we’re in a better spiritual
place, we still have the ability to provide
material gifts that are life-saving,”
Rodriguez said.
Schneps Community News Group TVG December 6, 2018 15