Images: 21-year-old suicide survivor undergoes a historic face transplant
Images: 21-year-old suicide survivor undergoes a historic face transplant 21-year-old suicide survivor, Katie Stubblefield, underwent a historic face transplant to turn over a new leaf in her life.
A 21-year-old survivor of a suicide attempt became the youngest person in the United States to undergo a face transplant after three years of reconstructive procedures and more than 15 hours on the operating table.
Katie Stubblefield, who is featured in National Geographic's "The Story of a Face" cover story in the September issue, had dubbed her pre-transplant, reconstructed face “Shrek,” and is still recovering from the May procedure.
According to the report, the bullet tore through her forehead, nose, sinuses, jaw bones and badly damaged her eyes. Surgeons responsible for saving her life in Memphis attempted to cover her facial wound using a tissue graft from her abdomen, but failed, and she arrived at the Cleveland Clinic with “her brain basically exposed.”
-PTC News
