Posted on 07/04/2009 5:43:21 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
London, U.K. (AHN) - A Briton who lost one eye and blinded the other in an accident was able to see again after part of his tooth was implanted in his eye socket as part of a unique sight-restoration surgery.
Martin Jones, 42, of Rotherham, South Yorkshire saw his wife for the first time when doctors removed the bandage off his operated eye.
"The doctors took the bandages off and it was like looking through water and then I saw this figure and it was her," Jones told The Daily Mail on Friday.
Jones had been blind for eight years when he married Gill, 50, four years ago. He lost his sight in 1997 when a tub of hot molten aluminum exploded in his face at work in a scrap yard. He was severely burned and his damaged left eye had to be removed.
Doctors tried to restore Jones' sight by using donated stem cells on his blind right eye but the operation was unsuccessful. Then Christopher Liu, a corneal specialist and Consultant Ophthalmic Surgeon based at Sussex Eye Hospital, Brighton used a revolutionary technique that involved the implantation of part of his tooth under his eyelid to hold an artificial lens. The tooth segment was used in place of a plastic holder because the body will not reject it.
A patch of skin grafted from under Jones' cheek was placed onto his eye and left there for two months so blood vessels can grow on it. The tooth implant is transplanted into the eye socket and the flap of grafted skin acting as the cornea is then placed over it. A hole is cut in the cornea to let light pass through the new lens.
The unique procedure has been done only 50 times in Britain.
Wait a minute...
Eye teeth good for something after all...
THere was an earlier thread pulled titled “Mexican Midget Wrestlers Killed by Fake Protitutes”. Is this related?
Why, yes. Yes it IS related! LOL!

"The first car I saw when my sight was restored was a Smart car and I couldn't stop laughing I'd never seen one before and I thought it had been chopped in half. From here.
Skin graft, tooth, blood vessels........eyeball.....
When he saw his wife for the first time, I wonder what his reaction would have been if she looked like Helen Thomas???????
Leni
| DOCTOR #1: | Who are you? Why aren't you masked? Who are these people? |
| DOCTOR #2: | I don't know. |
| DOCTOR #1: | What the hell is that? What are you doing? |
| McCOY: | Tearing of the middle meningeal artery... |
| DOCTOR #1: | What's your degree in, dentistry? |
| McCOY: | How do you explain slowing pulse, low respiratory rate and coma? |
| DOCTOR: | Fundoscopic examination... |
| McCOY: | Fundoscopic examination is unrevealing in these cases! |
| DOCTOR #1: | A simple evacuation of the expanding epidural hematoma will relieve the pressure. |
| McCOY: | My God, man, drilling holes in his head's not the answer. The artery must be repaired. Now put away your butcher knives and let me save this patient before it's too late! |
I miss all the good threads.
The mods pulled it before I clicked on the link.... :(
As usual, the headline is full of hype and turns out to be wrong. First of all, it’s only part of a tooth. Then it turns out the part of the tooth has only a minor role in this whole thing.
Of course the headline writers would never create a headline that says
“Small part of patient’s tooth plays important in sight-restoration surgery”
Well, Duh... ;)
Molar, bicuspid, or eye tooth?
Was it an eye tooth?
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