What’s In a Face?

That may be the question of the future, as medical experts conduct more face transplants.

Today, the world’s first full face transplant recipient – identified only as “Oscar” – showed off his new face at a press conference at a Spanish hospital.

Last March, over 30 doctors at the University Hospital Vall D’Hebron in Barcelona, Spain worked on “Oscar” whose face was severely injured in an accident.

The surgeons transplanted the entire facial skin and muscles, including the nose, lips, cheekbones, even the complete mouth, including the palate and teeth.

The full face transplant took just over 24 hours of surgery, and months of recovery.

Partial face transplants had successfully been done previously in France, China, the United States and Spain.

Organ donation has always been a controversial topic, but now may be reaching new levels of complexity. When an organ donor provides a much needed heart or liver to a person in need, the chances of the donor’s friends and family recognizing him or her are seldom to none.

In fact, one of the golden rules of organ donation is the donor’s family and friends are never told the name of the person or persons receiving the life-saving organs.

But a face – a human face – is perhaps the most common way we recognize one another.

Imaging walking down the street only to be shocked to see your deceased best friend stroll past? The thought is enough to send ghostly shivers up one’s spine.

Is it right to transpose another person’s likeness – their face – upon someone else? If we were able to alter the original face, how much is enough – and is this even ethically correct? Should the family and friends of the donor be told who the recipient of the new face is ahead of time? Should the donor’s family and the recipient’s meet – and if so, do either party have a vote in whether or not to proceed?

As modern medicine constantly amazes with new ways to mend us, we as a society will have to tackle the complex philosophical and ethical questions about the nature and value of these modern medicinal cures.

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• Face transplant recipient holds news conference (cbc.ca)
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• Doctor Claims First Entire Face Transplant (news.sky.com)
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Senior Robbed of $7,000 on Deathbed a Warning Call for Medical Facilities

So much for a nation of peaceful happy people – a senior citizen was robbed on her deathbed in a Toronto, Ontario, Canada hospital.

Cops in Canada’s largest city have released security camera images of two male suspects, who allegedly stole $7,000 CDN of jewelry from an unconscious seventy-year-old woman, just before she passed away.

The patient’s family had just stepped out for break from their trying ordeal, and returned to find all of the woman’s valuables gone.

A report says the woman died as police were interviewing the family.
Of all the low life things we human beings do to one another – of which sadly there are many – this is the lowest of the low.

Robbery victims feel a deep sense of loss for their stolen possessions, but far worse is the feeling that you have been violated. Someone has come into your personal space, and taken a piece of you away. It doesn’t matter if they stole the least valuable thing in the world, the psychological impacts of having anything stolen usually are the same.

Thieves that break into a home or business and steal under the shroud of darkness are weak, petty people, not worth the oxygen they consume. But thieves that enter a hospital, intentionally looking for incapacitated, sick and in this case, dying patients, unable to defend themselves are all of the above, and more. They are sick, sadistic, scum. They are the epitome of pure evil.

What kind of monster would even contemplate such a thing?

The suspects allegedly searched floor-by-floor within the hospital, until they found the palliative care unit (the section of the hospital specializing in medical care of senior citizens), according to local authorities involved in the case.

Clearly these two individuals planned to attack the old and the sick. They just happened to get lucky in that the woman was near death – making it unlikely that she would put up a struggle. She may not have even been aware anyone was in her room rifling through her things – she was unconscious at the time of the robbery.

Where were hospital security through all of this? Why were two complete strangers not questioned as they roamed around the hospital?

In our modern societies, we expect not only to be treated for what ails us when we go to a hospital, but that in the event we are unable to take care of ourselves, the staff of the hospital will.

This level of care doesn’t extend to just medical care, but to all levels. Think about it, if you were lying unconscious in a hospital bed, unaware of your surroundings wouldn’t you expect at the very least, that those around you would take steps to protect you from harm?

Robberies of this nature are rare – thankfully most people aren’t evil as the two who pulled off this heist – but that doesn’t absolve hospital staff from protecting their patients from factors not related to their medical conditions.

Some of the largest hospitals in Canada only have two security guards on per shift. When you are talking hospitals with over 1,000 patient beds, thousands of employees and thousands of people coming and going to see their loved ones, two security guards just isn’t enough.

Yes, nurses, doctors, and other hospital staff have some responsibility in ensuring their work location is secure for them and their patients, but they are often too busy tending to the medical needs of many people – demanding that they police their work areas is unreasonable.

In much of the westernized world we hear politicians talk a lot about their solutions to bring medical care to the masses. They talk about pumping more government funds into the latest medical equipment, adding more beds, even creating more jobs for doctors and nurses.

What politicians rarely talk about is protecting us when we are at our weakest. Chances are we ‘ve all heard a politician mention more funding for healthcare, but never for providing more security within that healthcare system.

The time has come for politicians and medical practitioners to raise the bar on patient safety and security within our medical facilities. We need to know that if and when we are unable to protect ourselves from evil criminal minds, those tasked with this enormous duty will.

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• Woman robbed at her deathbed in hospital (thestar.com)
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• Patients fight hospitals (& not just Catholic hospitals) for proper care (trueslant.com)
• Study shows strong interest in palliative care programs, services and integration vary across nation (scienceblog.com)