Hand transplantation is a surgical procedure to transplant a hand from one human to another.
The operation is carried out in the following order: bone fixation, tendon repair, artery repair, nerve repair, then vein repair. The operation typically lasts 8 to 12 hours. By comparison, a typical heart transplant operation lasts 6 to 8 hours.
The recipient of a hand transplant needs to take immunosuppressive drugs, as the body's natural immune system will try to reject, or destroy, the hand. These drugs cause the recipient to have a weaker immune system and mean that they may suffer severely even from minor infections.
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A hand transplant was performed in Ecuador in 1964, but the patient suffered from transplant rejection after only two weeks.
The first short-term success in human hand transplantion occurred with New Zealander Clint Hallam who had lost his hand in an accident while in prison. The operation was performed on September 23, 1998 in Lyon, France by a team assembled from different countries around the world. A microsurgeon on the team, Dr. Earl Owen from Australia, was privy to the detailed basic research, much of it unpublished, that had been carefully gathered by the team in Louisville. After the operation, Hallam wasn't comfortable with the idea of his transplanted hand and failed to follow the prescribed post-operative drug and physiotherapy. His inaccurate expectations became a vivid example of the necessity of a fully committed team of caregivers, including psychologists, that can correctly select and prepare the potential transplant recipients for the lengthy and difficult recovery and for the modest functional restoration of a transplanted hand to be expected. Hallam's transplanted hand was removed at his request on February 2, 2001 following another episode of rejection.
The first hand transplant to achieve prolonged success was directed by University of Louisville surgeons Drs. Warren Breidenbach and Tsu-Min Tsai in cooperation with the Kleinert Hand Institute and Jewish Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky. The procedure was performed on New Jersey native Matthew Scott on January 24, 1999. Scott had lost his hand in a fireworks accident at age 24. Later that year the Philadelphia Phillies asked him to do the honors of throwing out the ceremonial first pitch.
In contrast to the earlier attempts at hand transplantation, the Louisville group had performed extensive basic science research and feasibility studies for many years prior to their first clinical procedure.{for example, Shirbacheh et al, 1998} There also was considerable transparency and internal review board oversight involved in the screening and selection of prospective patients.
In March 2000, a team of surgeons at the University of Innsbruck in Austria began a series of three bilateral hand transplants over six years. The first was an Austrian police officer who had lost both hands attempting to defuse a bomb. He has completed an around-the-world solo motorcycle trip with his transplanted hands.
University of Louisville doctors also performed a successful hand transplant on Michigan native Jerry Fisher in February 2001, and Michigan resident David Savage in 2006.[1]
On January 14, 2004, the team of Professor Jean-Michel Dubernard (Edouard-Herriot Hospital, France) declared a five-year-old double hand transplant a success. The lessons learned in this case, and in the 26 other hand transplants (6 double) which occurred between 2000 and 2005, gave encouragement to other transplant operations of such organs as the face, abdominal wall or larynx.
On May 4, 2009 Jeff Kepner, a 57-year-old Augusta, Georgia, resident, underwent the first double hand transplant in the United States at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center by a team led by Dr. W.P. Andrew Lee, who also had been performing careful basic research on such transplants for many years. A CNN story on his follow up demonstrated the limited functional restoration to be expected, particularly following bilateral transplantation [1].
On February 18, 2010 the first female in the United States underwent hand transplantation at Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas. The procedure was performed by surgeons from The Hand Center of San Antonio and US Air Force. [2]
On June 22, 2010, a Polish soldier received two new hands from a female donor, after losing them three years earlier while saving a young recruit from a bomb.
On March 8, 2011, 26-year-old Emily Fennell underwent an 18 hour surgery to attach a right hand. This was performed in the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. [3] [4]
In the fall of 2011, 28-year-old Lindsay Ess received a double hand transplant at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in an 11 1/2 hour surgery. [5]
Although the one-year survival of the transplanted hands has been excellent with a fully committed institution, the number of hand transplants performed after 2008 has been small due to the drug-related side effects, the uncertain long-term outcome, and the high cost of the surgery, rehabilitation and immunosuppression (Schneeberger et al, 2008) [6]. [2]
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