Chinese Man Needs New Nose, Gets A Head Start
It's as plain as the nose on your... forehead? Doctors treating a young Chinese man whose nose suffered irreversible damage following an auto accident are growing him a replacement. Since it seems a mouse wasn't available, they're growing Xiaolian's new honker just above his left eye.
How on earth did Xiaolian get into this predicament? It all began back in August of 2012 when the 22-year-old from Fuzhou in China's Fujian province injured his nose in a car accident. Assuming his smarting schnozzola would heal by itself or being too miserly to seek medical attention (or both), Xiaolian procrastinated to the point where an infection took hold and permanently damaged his nasal cartilage.
Finally driven to seek professional medical advice, Xiaolian consulted with surgeons at the local hospital who told him his nose was a write-off... but that they could rebuild it using an unorthodox but proven effective technique. In effect, they would grow Xiaolian a new nose but they would need his help!
The first step was to form a nose-shaped “scaffold” from skin tissue expanders supported by cartilage harvested from Xiaolian's living ribs. In order to encourage Xiaolian's body to build on the base and provide the proto-nose with a blood and oxygen supply while it developed, the doctors made a small incision in Xiaolian's forehead and inserted the nose under his skin.
There it sits at press time and according to Xiaolian's doctors the new nose is not only developing as planned, they're hoping to shift it from his forehead to its proper place sometime soon. Reportedly Xiaolian couldn't be happier though he did NOT end his interview by saying “Smell ya later!” (via Zoe Mintz/IBT and Joe.ie, images via Mirror/Reuters)