Transplant, Organ Transplant | featured news

It turns out you can recycle just about anything these days - even kidneys and other organs donated for transplants. Recently in Chicago, in what is believed to be the first documented case of its kind in the U.S., a transplanted kidney that was failing was removed from a patient while he was still alive and given to somebody else.

They savor pizza and burgers, no longer frighten children, and many of them can walk the streets without people knowing they have someone else's cheeks, nose, lips and skin. People who have had face transplants increasingly are going public, helping to transform an operation that six years ago was daredevil theory into one that is widely accepted....

Andrea Ybarra's donated heart was beating rhythmically by the time she awoke from the grogginess of her surgery. Lub-dub. Lub-dub. Lub-dub. In fact, it was warm and pumping even before doctors transplanted it.

A French surgeon said Thursday he has conducted a full-face transplant including eyelids and tear ducts, in a rare operation on a 35-year-old man with a genetic disorder.

Renee Patterson's most precious present this Christmas won't be under her tree, and it didn't come from a store. This holiday, she says, she got her life back.

The nation's first double hand transplant patient can wriggle his new fingers a litte bit now and grab a tennis ball, but what he really wants to do is be able to feel his wife's hands when he holds them.