With science, what is impossible today is possible tomorrow.
Body parts transplant cognates back in 1950s when dog head transplant procedure
was done, unfortunately, the dog died due to immune reaction. This was
inspiring for the future of science and in 1970, a successful transplant of the
head of a monkey to the body of another monkey was done by Robert White - a
neurosurgeon and his colleague, a professor of neurological surgery. They
further added that what has been achieved with animal model can be accomplished
in human sphere.
In humans, head transplant has a lot of social,
cultural, moral and other ethical issues to be justified for the procedure to
be carried out. More to this, there should be adequate and advanced
technological support to address this issue. Somehow, this can be justified on
the grounds that there are helpless medical conditions which are physically
disabling and the procedure may add value in managing these conditions.
Common post: Zika Virus; WHO Declares A Public Health Emergency.
“Can you imagine looking around a room and you are just a
head?” That is the question Dr. Jerry Silver asks as he terms the head
transplant surgery as barbaric and may not be feasible even 100 years to come.
But this contradicts what Dr. Sergio Canavero –an Italian neurosurgeon, thinks
about the future of science in head transplant surgery. Dr. Canavero’s projection is to do
first head transplant by end of 2017 either in China or United States. One of
the subjects willing to be involved in the project is a Russian in origin
battling with Type 1 spinal muscular atrophy with a rapidly diminishing health
status. Dr. Canavero has many requests
especially from people with transgender issues to be considered as subjects for the
project.
According to MNT, the procedure will involve disconnection
of donors head and spinal cord cut with ultra-sharp blade to avoid more injury
to the spinal cord cut ends. Then the donor and recipient spinal cord will be
fused together, muscles sutured together and blood vessels reconnected. This
may take 36 hours and may involve about 100 surgeons to carry out the
procedure. The subjects will then be
allowed to stay in coma for 3-4 weeks during which the nerve endings at the
severed endings of spinal cord are electrically stimulated and expected to
connect. After this, the subjects will be required to undergo assisted physical
therapy for a year before they learn to walk.
This project has been received with a lot of criticism as
there are moral and social issues to be addressed as well as the question of
medical ethics behind head transplant. The chances of this project
HEAVEN-GEMINI going through seems ulikely. Dr. Canavero hurdles when asked said
that there is likelihood of the recipient’s immune system rejecting the donated
head and secondly, complete fusing of the severed ends of the spinal cord.
More posts:
References:
30-year-old Russian man volunteers for world’s first head
transplant- Medical News Today. Address: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/292306.php.
HEAVEN: the head anastomosis venture Project outline for the
first human head transplantation with spinal linkage (GEMINI)- NCBI. Address: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3821155/
Head Transplant- Wikipedia, The free encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head_transplant
