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  • These days it seems like we can stitch any part of the body to anyone. People are getting

  • new livers, hands, even faces. But what about penises?

  • Hi everyone, Julian here for DNews. It’s a sad reality that, as long as you have a

  • body, you can lose pieces of it. Accidents or tragedies can leave people missing parts

  • of themselves and until very recently, they would have to cope with the loss for the rest

  • of their lives.

  • Soldiers wounded in war know that reality all too often, as Improvised Explosive Devices,

  • also known as IEDs, frequently maim the men and women they don’t outright kill. Denise

  • Grady of the New York Times reported that often times male soldiers who wake up from

  • surgery are foremost concerned if their genitals are intact. Sergeant First Class Aaron Causey

  • lost both legs and a testicle to an IED and said that the psychological trauma of the

  • genital damage made it so much worse than the physical loss.

  • With that in mind, doctors are preparing to perform the first ever penis transplant in

  • the United States within the next year. Two previous attempts have been reported to journals,

  • so the surgery is still every experimental. So much so that the surgeons at Johns Hopkins

  • University School of Medicine have been researching and practicing on cadavers in preparation.

  • Theyve used brightly colored food dyes to map out the circulatory system in the cadaver

  • penises and have discovered previously unknown aspects of the blood supply.. When it comes

  • time for the operation, theyll have to connect two to six nerves, six or seven arteries,

  • and the urethra, the tube that runs inside the penis.

  • If all goes well, they expect the grafted member to be more than just for show. After

  • allowing a few months for healing, the doctors expect the ability to urinate and feel sensation

  • through it will be restored. Eventually the patient will even be able to use it for sex

  • again.

  • Of course if you have a penis, or even if you don’t, the thought of having someone

  • else’s attached may concern you. That’s actually why the first ever penis transplant

  • in China back in 2006 failed. The operation was a success, but after 15 days the patient

  • claimed the psychological effects couldn’t be overcome, and the operation was reversed.

  • Dr. Gerald Brandacher of Johns Hopkins isn’t as concerned. He’s grafted new hands onto

  • patients since 1998, and although hands are a deeply personal part of our anatomy every

  • patient he’s ever had immediately started referring to the replacement as though it

  • were their own.

  • If they do regain the ability to have sex, there’s something else that can be their

  • own too; their children. So long as a testicle was left intact, then the genetic material

  • they pass on will be their own. In fact, the second and thus far only successful recipient

  • of a donor penis, a young man in South Africa who underwent surgery in 2014, reported this

  • year that he would become a father.

  • No loss of a body part is ever easy, but the stigma that comes with injured genitals makes

  • it that much more difficult. If the operation at Johns Hopkins is a success and moves out

  • of the realm of experimental surgery, it will go a long way towards helping wounded veterans

  • or similarly injured civilians heal.

  • A transplant is more complicated than just sewing everything together, and many of them

  • fail. Julia explains why it’s not a perfect solution here.

These days it seems like we can stitch any part of the body to anyone. People are getting

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