Injured airman has groundbreaking surgery

[unhappycamper]

Injured airman has groundbreaking surgery
By Tom Spoth - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Dec 31, 2009 17:46:09 EST

~snip~

To save his life, doctors had to remove his pancreas during one of 11 surgeries to repair the damage caused by an Afghan insurgent.

Without his pancreas, Porfirio would normally face life as a severe diabetic, with daily insulin injections and a higher risk of blindness, kidney failure, amputations and strokes.

But groundbreaking surgery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Washington, D.C., is expected to keep that from happening. Surgeons at Walter Reed, working with a Florida doctor who developed the procedure, took cells from Porfirio’s pancreas and injected them into his liver.

The surgery was the first known successful transplant of insulin-producing cells after severe trauma resulting in the complete loss of the pancreas, according to Walter Reed officials. If all goes as planned, the cells inside Porfirio’s liver will produce insulin that normally would come from his pancreas.

The procedure began the night before Thanksgiving, when doctors at Walter Reed packed Porfirio’s pancreas in ice and shipped it by airplane to Dr. Camillo Ricordi at the University of Miami.


Rest of article at: http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/12/airforce_surgery_011110w/