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Change your Life! |
First transplanted hand showing signs of rejection |
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News
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May 1, 2000
PERTH, Australia, APR 30 (AP) - A New Zealand man who underwent the world's first hand transplant is in danger of losing the hand 18 months after it was grafted onto his arm, a spokesman said Sunday.
Clint Hallam, 49, is receiving treatment at Perth's Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital for rejection of the hand, the spokesman said on condition of anonymity.
The spokesman refused to give further details. Hallam made international headlines in September 1998 when a team of surgeons in Lyon, France, grafted the hand of a 41-year-old motorcyclist on to his forearm in a 13-hour operation.
Since then, doctors in Louisville, Ky., have performed a similar operation, and a team led by the French surgeon who attached Hallam's new hand has performed a double arm transplant.
Hallam was serving a two-year sentence for fraud in New Zealand when he lost his right hand in a chain saw accident in prison.
Last year, he said he hoped one day to learn to play the piano and told the Sunday Times newspaper he already was performing simple tasks with the hand such as holding a cup of coffee and swimming.
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