Posted on 05/16/2016 10:07:48 AM PDT by Maceman
BOSTON, MA - In a 15-hour procedure spanning two days and performed by a more than 50-member team, surgeons at Boston's Massachusetts General Hospital have completed the first penis transplant in the U.S.
Thomas Manning, a 64-year-old bank courier for Halifax, lost his penis to cancer in 2012 and was the recipient of the transplant. The organ came from a deceased donor.
In a press conference Monday, MGH surgeons described the intense isolation and loss that comes with losing the penis, as a result of injury or illness.
"Ultimately, it's a loss of self-identity," said Dr. Dicken Ko, the team leader and director of MGH's regional urology program. "These devastating losses are endured by themselves alone, and often in silence."
Manning, who surgeons described as a "courageous patient," was one such person. Manning "coped very well with his diagnosis," but "felt the loss" after a partial penectomy, the result of a diagnosis of rare and potentially fatal penile cancer, said his physician, Dr. Adam Feldman. He volunteered for the transplant, Feldman said.
"He wants to be whole again, he wants to be... not in the shadows," said Curtis Cetrulo, who led Manning's surgical team. "That really echoes what a lot of patients with these injuries feel like. It's difficult to talk about."
Surgeons said Manning is doing well Monday, roughly one week since the surgery was completed. They remain "cautiously optimistic."
The surgery means there is potential for other special tissue transplants, such as ears or fingers, Ko said. It also has potential implications for transgender surgeries, although that is outside their initial scope, surgeons said.
(Excerpt) Read more at patch.com ...
I’m not going to touch this with a ten foot pole. (or a Hungarian, a Chec or a Slovak.)
Exactly. I’m with you.
When I posted this, I figured there would be some smart remarks, but I hadn’t figured that the entire comment thread would consist almost entirely of posters who sounded like they were in junior high school.
I feel the same way. This is shameful. I don’t have any problem, no, I am all for breast reconstruction surgery for women who have had trauma or cancer, and I feel 100% the same way about this.
I laugh as hard as anyone when I see a stupid skateboarder racking his nuts on a railing, or some guy’s kid hitting him in the crotch with the pinata bat, but...
This isn’t that.
I know. We all do this kind of thing on occasion, the Internet is rife with it, I’ve done it...poking fun at something like this, but...okay. Enough.
And guys are far worse, even when it is a friend who has been nailed...and even later, when the guy is feeling better, HE laughs about it, then laughs at some poor schlub who gets a line drive in the crotch.
We wince, but we laugh. It is true, and when a guy is rolling on the ground, the other guys kind of gather around him, making little jokes to break things up a bit, until the guy on the ground, his face bathed in sweat, manages to make a humorous remark about it too.
Years later, when having beers, we still laugh uproariously at the memory, the person who took the hit usually the one telling the story.
Sigh. I guess it is just part and parcel of being a guy.
Yes IMMIC, their are something like 1600 Vets that are injured in that area and are in the need of successful transplant surgery. I have heard or read at least 2 of these Vets are in the queue for such surgery. If ( and that is a big if ) printing of tissue is making inroads in the medical community, then printing replacement tissue or organs for our Vets is not a bad place to spend medical R & D monies IMHO...
They would have included photos but it was a bit ‘hard on’ the eyes.
I always wonder about that. This is important work, all jokes aside. Because it must be horrible for young men in their prime to lose that part of their body.
A penis isn’t any more to their manhood as a tooth or a strand of hair. Their brain is and how they choose to behave is.
I couldn't care less if I lost a breast. Some fatty flesh doesn't define me.
I have lived a blessed life in comparison to an Iraq war veteran who has had his penis blown off by a terrorist explosion.
You seem to be an expert on how they feel. Or how they should feel.
I know we all feel the same about this, it just BURNS MY ASS that that our vets even have to realize that there are tax monies out there being used for “gender assignment surgery” or whatever they call it now, when that money could be used for things like your suggestion.
If he plays with it you know another mans wee wee does that make hime gehy?
you owe me a new monitor and keyboard.. LOL
Did the patient receive the John Holmes or Pee Wee Herman model?
transplant one to Anthony Weiner’s forehead
Oh ,wait a minute , he already has one there . It’s his nose.
“The most amazing part of this story is that the thread hasn’t been shut down yet.”
They’re waiting for it to get a little longer...
Dr. Dicken Ko....No. Just can not be.
Shorty's ESSO Service Center, Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. Happy Motoring begins at the Esso Sign.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.