New York, Sept 27 (ANI): Surgeons from an Oklahoma hospital used a part of a man's leg to reconstruct his face, after it was disfigured in a horrific fireworks accident.
The man is currently recovering from a 22-hour long reconstructive surgery.
Taron Pounds, 22, lost portions of his face, eye, neck and chest after a fireworks mortar detonated unexpectedly in front of him on July 7, at a family celebration in Inola, Oklahoma.
According to TV station KJRH, Pounds lost most of the structure that held the middle of his face together - including bones that supported his cheeks, left eye and the roof of his mouth, the New York Daily News reported.
Drs. Trinitia Cannon and Jose Sanclement carried out the surgery to restore Pounds' face with tissue from other parts of his body on Friday at OU Medical Center.
"We were able to take bone and skin from his leg, as well as blood vessels that keep that skin alive and we basically reconstructed his face with that," Cannon said.
Sanclament said that they were transplanting a piece of bone to another place in the body.
"It is sort of like a puzzle finding the right pieces and then when we have the right pieces, we establish blood supply," he said.
Surgeons had already stabilized Pound's jaw with plates during a previous surgery, but needed to wait for a few weeks before moving onto the delicate procedure.
The damage was initially so bad that when Cannon first met Pounds she was unable to identify his nasal passages, according to NewsOK. (ANI)
