Surgeons have given a human an entirely new eye for the first time in a groundbreaking new addition to facial transplant procedures. The recipient, Arkansas native Aaron James, lost his left eye and half his face when he survived a deadly 7,200-volt electric shock in June 2021.
The 46-year-old military veteran was working as a lineman when his face accidentally touched a live wire, also causing extensive injuries to his dominant left arm above the elbow, his nose, lips, teeth, cheek and chin down to the bone. Just two months later, the NYU Langone team met James, and they started to discuss and evaluate facial transplants. Then on May 27, 2023, a team of more than 140 surgeons, nurses and other health care professionals led a 21-hour surgery to give James his face back, including a new eye in a world first. The procedure used an entire left eye and a portion of a face from a single donor, also marking the first time these have successfully been combined in any transplant cas