Joe DiMeo received the world's first face and hands transplant. It's only been attempted twice before.
This is his incredible story...
This is his incredible story...
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00I was coming home from work from a night shift and I guess I fell asleep on the steering wheel and just rolled off the road and my car flipped and caught on fire.
00:13I was in a coma for like three and a half months and then like an extra month just waking up and like trying to exercise a little bit.
00:30He sustained about 80% total body surface area burns. Most people with that amount of burns they don't survive and that has severely compromised his life.
01:00Gary is really shaping up into the picture that we start seeing in high school, right?
01:24I think I was maybe a seventh grade.
01:37I think to Joe this operation basically translates to independence and freedom and the more independence that we can provide him, which is the case with his new hands and face, the happier he'll be and you can see this in him.
01:54The progress so far has actually really gone ahead of schedule.
02:13My motivation to get things done is really high up there and I'm really working on the small muscles in my hands to spread them out and pick them up right.
02:27For the next person in line to get their surgery done, there's always a thousand ways to be sad about something but there's always a million ways to be happy. You always have to find the good in something bad and there's always a way to find something good in something bad.