In shocking reports, the world just might be witness to the first human head transplant within the next two years. That is what Dr. Sergio Canavero, an Italian surgeon, is saying. He claims to have created a procedure that would make the radical surgery possible. Dr. Canavero, who is associated with the Italian Turin Advanced Neuro-modulation Group, first suggested the idea in 2013. He went on to write a summary of the method he thinks will permit physicians to transplant one person’s head onto another one’s body.
The procedure, published in the medical journal Surgical Neurology International, encompasses cooling down the receiver’s head and the donor’s body in order to be able to spread out the time their cells could survive without receiving any oxygen.
Tissue located above the neck is separated and all of the key blood vessels are linked by using small tubes, before the two spinal cords are severed. Effectively cutting the cords is essential, declared the surgeon. After which, the recipient’s head would be placed on top of the donor’s body and each end of the spinal cord would then be united together.
In order to perform such a feat, Dr. Canavero explained that the area would have to be flushed with a chemical known as polyethylene glycol, and keep doing so with many hours of injections of the fluid. In the way that hot water causes spaghetti to stick together, polyethylene glycol does the same with fat in cell membranes.
The surgeons would next have to suture blood supply to muscles and the recipient would be put in a medically induced coma for at least a month, if not longer, to prevent any type of movement from the individual. Electrodes would be implanted that would give steady electrical stimulation to the spinal cord, due to the fact that research advises this can possibly toughen brand new nerve connections.
Once the recipient wakens, Dr. Canavero suggests the individual would be able to feel his or her face, move like normal and speak in the same tone of voice. He explained that with physiotherapy, the patient should be able to be up and walking around within a year. Several individuals have, allegedly, already volunteered for the surgery in order to receive a new body.
The surgeon stated that the most complicated part will be getting the two spinal cords to fuse together. Polyethylene glycol has been shown to speed up the growth of spinal cord nerves in animals, and Dr. Canavero plans to try out some experiments on brain-dead organ donors.
He wants to mainly use such a radical surgery in order to try and extend the lives of individuals whose organs are all encased with cancer or who have nerves and muscles which have almost completely disintegrated. The surgeon also believes the operation could even be used to help people who suffer from gender dysmorphia.
Dr. Canavero explained that the surgery might have far ranging implications for people who feel like they are trapped in the wrong sex body, such as a man feels as if he should have been a woman and a woman feels like she should have been a man. This is a condition that can cause some people to want to commit suicide. The surgeon thinks they should be given a chance if they so want to go for such a drastic procedure.
Dr. Canavero is planning on announcing his idea at the yearly medical conference of the American Academy of Neurological and Orthopedic Surgeons, which is being held in Maryland this year. Click here to read the previous journal submitted by the doctor.