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Jul 16, 2009 8:20 pm US/Eastern
Man Receives Double-Hand Transplant At UPMC
Jeff Kepner Becomes 1st Person In U.S. To Have Procedure
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ―
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Jeff Kepner became the first man in the United States to receive a double hand transplant.
KDKA
A 57-year-old Air Force veteran, and former softball pitcher and pastry chef is the first person in the U.S. to get a transplant of both hands.
And how's he feeling with his new hands?
"I can't feel anything as yet. I can move my hand, my fingers," says Jeff Kepner of Augusta, Ga. "It's long and it's tedious, and they work me like a dog. Considering that, everything is going well."
He lost his hands and feet because of complications from a severe infection.
He was functioning well with prosthetics. At the urging of his wife, he took part in the hand transplant study at UPMC.
He wanted to be able to touch and feel again, and do simple things.
"If a light bulb burned out, I couldn't replace it, not with my hooks," Kepner said. "Taking my own showers again would be nice. It will really free me up and free her up," he says, pointing to his wife.
"This is actually the first time I held his hand in ten years," says his wife Valarie Kepner. "And he said, it's actually nice I'm able to squeeze it back."
"I thought I'd wake up after the operation and be able to do some things. I don't know why I thought that. But that's just me," Jeff Kepner said.
It took a nine-hour, two-team surgery to connect all the bones, tendons, vessels and nerves, taking into account limb length.
"I really wasn't concerned, to be honest with you," says Valarie. "I knew he was in good hands."
"Jeff in the last 11 weeks has showed no sign of rejection in his transplanted hands," says Dr. W. P. Andrew Lee, the chief of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at UPMC.
"We anticipate it will be nine to 12 months before Jeff will get feelings in his hands, and at least a year or two before he will have all the movements in his fingers."
Kepner has met his donor's family and has seen his picture.
"I just think of thanking this gentleman for making it possible for me to do this," he says with emotion.
Transplant patients would generally have to take several medicines to prevent rejection, which can put them at risk for infection and other serious complications.
However, Kepner is getting a special protocol developed here in Pittsburgh. He got immune system proteins. He takes just a single anti-rejection drug. He also got bone marrow from the hand donor, a 23-year-old year old man from Dubois who died in an accident.
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