Automobile accidents often end tragically, and for Shamika Burge the collapse of personal transport was no exception. Because of a malfunction of a wheel its car has failed directly during movement and some times has turned over. As a result – multiple injuries of the head, spine and torn left ear. Fortunately, the patient managed to recover, but her ear did not return to her. She wanted to install the prosthesis when her treating doctors from the William Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso offered a new, very unusual way: to grow a new ear on her own body and transplant it to her original place!
There was only one small nuance: the new ear was originally to be formed … on the arm.
By itself this technique is not new and with its help several successful operations have already been carried out. The doctors cut out a piece of cartilage from the woman’s rib and gave it a shape of the auricle. After that, they implanted the cartilaginous tissues under the skin on the forearm of the Burge. Thanks to the regenerative processes, the cartilage gradually turns into a full-fledged ear: on it, like on a frame, nerve endings and blood vessels are formed. When the ear was fully ripe – it was only necessary to take it out and sew it back to its original place, together with a small amount of skin from the forearm to cover the scars from the accident.
Currently, the procedure is not yet complete, and Shamik has two more operations. But, according to the doctors’ forecasts, when the treatment is over, the new ear will become indistinguishable from the native one, and in five years no one will know the transplant at all.
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