REMARKABLE OPERATION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 324, 10 June 1911, Page 10

REMARKABLE OPERATION.

At St. John's Hospital, New York (sa.ys the correspondent of the Daily Telegraph on March 21), the surgeons have almost finished building an entirely news face on Timothy Martin, who, several months ago, was shockingly disfigured by falling head downwards into the cog-wheels of some machinery. His mouth and nose were gone, and the muscles of the face cut so badly that he could neither eat nor talk. Martin did not die, but displayed remarkable vitality, so that finally the chief problem before the surgeons was whether his face could be restored to some semblance of human shape and beauty. Specialists held a consultation, and* decided to make the attempt. The first step was to make a new mouth and build muscles around it, so that Martin could learn again to talk and eat. The process was slow, and the surgery delicate and difficult, but the doctors worked patiently, and Martin was courageous and hopeful. Gradually the new mouth was shaped, the surgeons adding muscles taken from other parts of the body, and knitting them to what had been left of the muscles of the face. The muscles slowly grew strong, and by degrees Martin learned to use them, and was joyful at being able to speak to the surgeons.

At last, Martin became -abio to pat with cusp, and talk almost as well as before the accident. Skin was "rafted to the mouth and cheek with such deftness that the lower part of the face, it is said, was almost the same as that of an ordinary man. Tho next and final step was to provide a new nose. That work began yesterday. Tho man's left arm was fixed rig-idly to the upper left side of Ihe face. The nail of the little finger was removed, «md that finger slit lengthwise, and the freshlv-opened llesh was laid in the hollow of'the face where (lie nose formerly was. The plan was to let the finger grow fast in its place, ami, when the cohesion had become sufficiently strong, to amputate the finger and continue the work building the skin around tho nose.