Science-Fiction becomes Science-Fact

Disclaimer: Video contains images of Wiens pre-surgery and may be disturbing to some viewers. Viewer discretion advised.

"What is now proved was once only imagined." - William Blake

This aptly describes the medical miracle that took place at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston last week when a medical team of more than 30 professionals performed the first full-face transplant on 25-year-old Dallas Wiens.  

Wiens, a construction worker and family man, was working outside Ridgelea Baptist Church in Ft. Worth in 2008 when his boom lift drifted into high-voltage wires. The jolt of electricity burned most of the skin off his face and caused him to lose his sight. The accident placed Wiens in a coma for three months and in the intervening years he has undergone 22 reconstructive surgeries.

Skin from his legs was used to cover the exposed bone where his face had been but Wiens was left with no feeling and no muscle control. One eye is gone, and the other is non-functioning and was sealed beneath the skin graft.

The transplant was made possible by an anonymous donor and took more than 15 hours. Muscles and nerve endings were replaced along with nose, lips, and facial skin. Wiens will now have sensation in his forehead and right cheek with a lesser amount restored to the left side of his new face. He will also regain his sense of smell.

This type of surgery was pure science fiction 15 years ago and served as the plot to the highly acclaimed action film Face/Off starring John Travolta and Nicolas Cage. In the movie, Travolta’s and Cage’s characters undergo “experimental surgery” that gives each the other’s face. At the time it was hard to imagine this becoming a reality.

Although the surgery will restore some facial features, doctors explained Wiens would not look the way he looked prior to the accident. Unlike in the movie, he will not look like his donor, either.

Wiens is excited to receive the surgery but not for the reasons you might think. It will be nice to have a face again, but Wiens is most excited about the ability to feel his daughter’s kisses on his cheek. He said he can simulate a kissing noise but has not been able to form a kiss or feel one from three-year-old Scarlette since the accident.

This is an amazing and inspiring story. Wiens has kept a positive attitude and is looking toward the future and other possible medical breakthroughs. When asked by ABC News affiliate WFAA how he felt about not regaining his sight, Wiens replied, “Fifteen years ago a face transplant was science fiction. What's going to happen in the next 15 years? I've got a lot of life left.”