Ethical experts are to decide this week whether doctors will be able to perform the world’s first full face transplant in Britain. If the ethical committee of the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, northwest London, gives approval on Wednesday, surgeons there will be able start looking for a suitable patient.
Last November the world’s first partial face transplant took place in France. Surgeons led by Jean-Michel Dubernard carried out the operation on a woman whose face had been mauled by her pet dog.
The British project’s leader, Peter Butler, consultant plastic surgeon at the Royal Free, has spent 14 years researching the procedure. However, his spokesman emphasised that even if permission were granted, it would not mean that a transplant was imminent. The patient selection process could take up to a year, he said.
“No one has been chosen. The final selection process has not yet begun,” he said.