Cost Of Back Surgery

What face transplants can, can't do

What, exactly, is a face transplant?

The question is being asked anew with the release of dramatic before-and-after images of Charla Nash, the Connecticut woman mauled by a chimpanzee and the latest person to receive a face transplant.

Some 17 people in the world now have undergone the experimental and still misunderstood procedure, says Maria Siemionow, MD, PhD, director of plastic surgery research at the Cleveland Clinic.

Siemionow, who led the team that performed the first U.S. face transplant , says that in one way, a face transplant is like a kidney transplant: It comes from a human donor.

"But a face you can see and a kidney you cannot," Siemionow tells WebMD. "So this becomes much more of an issue. The face has many arteries, veins, muscles, and nerves which have to be reconstructed to the extent they will bring back facial motion. The patient has to be able to smile, to purse the lips, to present happy expressions. This is very different from any other transplant."

Nash, who was initially under the care of Cleveland Clinic surgeons, eventually received the transplant at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. She is still recovering from complications of surgery, but issued a dramatic statement thanking her doctors -- and most of all thanking the anonymous deceased woman who donated her face.

"I will now be able to do things I once took for granted," Nash says in the statement. "I will be able to smell. I will be able to eat normally. I will no longer be disfigured. I will have lips and will speak clearly once again. I will be able to kiss and hug loved ones. I am tremendously grateful to the donor and her family."

Facial reconstruction surgeon John Girotto, MD, director of the craniofacial anomalies center at the University of Rochester's Golisano Children's Hospital, says face transplants can indeed fulfill such expectations.

"Does it really work? Yes. Do you look like the donor? A little bit, but you still look like yourself," Girotto tells WebMD. "We are not quite there yet -- it is still an experimental thing -- but face transplant holds great promise for people with terrible injuries and no other established options."

Who is a candidate for a face transplant?

"It is a very drastic procedure, so you need to have an extremely disfiguring facial injury or birth defect for which other standard reconstructive techniques aren't good enough," Girotto says. "Things like shotgun wounds to the face; large, full-skin-thickness burns ; and in Asia, it's also been used for people with neurofibromatosis [a disfiguring genetic disease].

Laser Spine Surgery Houston A Better Option To Traditional Back ...

Spine problems can make life very difficult and painful for many people. If you suffer from constant back pain that does not go away with painkillers and therapy, you might want to look into laser spine surgery Houston that can offer you some facilities that offer lasering treatment for serious back or neck problems.

This type of back operation is an alternative procedure to the usual spinal fusion one. Both procedures can relieve pain in the back and neck. These surgeons use a lasering device to remove bone spurs and repair herniated disks. Tangled nerves and disk problems can be debilitating and cause extreme pain for patients.

Traditional back surgical procedure involves making large incisions either in the back or front of your body. That is something that can be avoided with the latest medical technology. Healing time will be hastened and post operation pain will decrease. These procedures can also be performed with less anaesthetic which decreases negative effects of operation.

The operations involve less risk and fewer complications. Patients will tend to recuperate faster with laser surgery than with traditional invasive operations. These procedures though are a little costly and may not be covered by your health insurance policy. Ask your insurer if they can cover the cost of this back operation.

If your insurer will not cover the cost of your operation, then that means you will have to cover the cost. Find out if the medical facility can provide other means of payment systems like an installment scheme. Ask your doctor for suggestions on how to pay for your spinal procedure. You should also ask your doctor about the locations of hospitals that offer this type of operation.

Not all states have facilities or hospitals have the latest medical equipment or surgeons who can perform them. If you want this kind of treatment, you might have to go to a different state to get laser spine surgery Houston which is one city in the United States that offer these procedures for back problems.

Looking to find the most comprehensive information on laser spine surgery Houston ?

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