Face transplant patient loves fresh strawberries

Face transplant patient loves fresh strawberries

PARIS - Isabelle Dinoire, the world's first face transplant recipient has received more than a fair share of publicity in recent days. Media reports were flooded with how she had reverted to smoking and that her doctors were worried about a transplant rejection due to this.

However, Dinoire dismissed all this talk in an exclusive interview to the People magazine, "There have been reports about me riding a bicycle through the streets, but these are nonsense. Lots has been said about how happy I am. But this has not always been the case," she told the magazine in what is her first interview since she underwent a surgery on November 27 last year.

Dinoire's face had been botched up by her Labrador last spring and she decided to undergo a face transplant, which was performed by French doctors. "I spend almost all of my time in my hospital room. Here I have radio and television, and there is also an exercise bike in the corner of the room. I haven't started using it yet, but that may change, I suppose," she said from her room at the Eduard Herriot hospital.

She added that she has been eating as much as she can since she wants to gain weight. "I love fresh strawberries, but have also eaten omelettes, chocolate cake and all kinds of other foods," she said.

Mrs. Dinoire, who is a mother of two children, has been ordered to eat properly. She is also enjoying meeting her daughters, who were allowed to visit her. But it has not been all hunky-dory, "I spent Christmas here, which was pretty awful really.

The doctors cannot yet give me a date to go home." Her doctors say that she is making good progress, "Her facial expressiveness is slowly returning and she is talking quite clearly, although she has some problems with the letters p and b, which require the lips," said Dr Bernard Devauchelle, who led the surgery team.

"Psychologically, she has totally accepted her new face. Her return to smoking is not the best thing. She smokes fag after fag. But if that's what she wants to do, we can't stop her." Last month, there was a slight scare when her body appeared to reject the tissue, but that has now been overcome, he added.