First ever head transplant patient: I value my life and have trust in science

[a99az]

This reminds me of the old joke about brains in a jar. I was being taken around a famous medical facility and I saw a number of brains in jars they where all labelled in detail with where they where taken from and price. What struck me was the disparity between the British brain at $2000 and the African brain at $25000. I asked my guide why such a difference? He said " the African one had, had little use where as the British one was over used and worn out.

But back to the subject I guess he wound be feeling himself for a while after the op.

Edited September 9, 2015 by a99az

[SOTIRIOS]

...creepy...

[ozyjon]

I don't believe it.

[ResandePohm]

should be called body-transplant

Head transplant is what many TV members are in need of

[wabothai]

Guess where you can but heads.

[SteveB2]

J. B. S. Haldane's classic 1940 narration of Doctor Sergei S. Bryukhonenko experiments come to mind:-

as do Doctor Robert J. White's work with monkeys

Even after 70 years of research it has to be said that medical science truly still does not understand the working of the human mind, nor is it even capable of re-connecting a severed spine of a living patient (yet alone a completely severed head) - so the likely hood of this operation being a success is practically zero.

I would like to add – why don’t the surgical team just go for trying to reconnect someone’s spinal column after a broken back injury? now that would be a useful stepping stone who's success would improve the lives to thousands of broken back sufferers worldwide...

I guess it’s just the publicity associated with attempting to reconnect a severed head. Well, those surgeons really better have their shit together. Lack of blood supply leading to onset of brain death occurs in just 2 mins.. Immediate onset of unconsciousness caused by lack of blood pressure occurs in just 15 seconds...

I wish the transplant volunteer the best of luck - but in truth, I do not expect a happy outcome from this experiment at all.

[peterb17]

There doesn't seem to be lot of difficulty in this except for the SPINAL CORD! They are going to have to sever the spinal cord and then somehow reconnect all of the nerve tissue or cords to the corresponding ones on the donor body's spine...sorry, I just can't believe we are even close to doing this yet. Do they even know what the consequences are when all signals from the body to the brain disappear. There has got to be some reaction from the brain to this.

Think you are correct here- one of the most difficult topics to teach my biology students was the conduction of nerve impulses through neurones- it's complicated, but stunningly elegant if you are a science nerd.

Without a bit of research, I don't know the exact number of neurones in the spinal cord - it must be thousands; sensory and motor.

This is just science fiction- just internet nonsense.

[peterb17]

I hope they get it screwed on straight.

I know quite a few that could use a head transplant.

The problem is that if it works, she won't be who she was. She will be someone else and no previous memories of her old life or self.

Mmm a Thai Visa member who could probably benefit from a head transplant.

It's a HE not SHE - Valery is a common Russian male name.

The whole point is his body is failing- not his mind- similar to what happened to Stephen Hawking ( he has managed to expand our view of the universe)

So will be old head on a new body.

It's all just total rubbish of course .

[Acharn]

I hope they get it screwed on straight.

I know quite a few that could use a head transplant.

The problem is that if it works, she won't be who she was. She will be someone else and no previous memories of her old life or self.

Don't quite follow your reasoning here. We're not talking about reincarnation. We're talking about moving the whole brain, or maybe the whole head, to a different body. Since this has never been done, we don't know how it will affect her mind. People used to think that a heart transplant would produce profound personality changes; not we know better. I'm really dubious they could get all the nerves connected properly, but at least there has been recent research on inducing nerve cell regeneration.

[whatawonderfulday]

Apparently they were proposing to do a head swap between a baboon and a certain Prime Minster, but called it off when all indications were the baboon would reject it

Edited September 9, 2015 by whatawonderfulday

[boomerangutang]

Steve Martin beat 'em to it: Check out the movie: The Man With Two Brains.

[bofhman]

I hope he gets a head in life and not a behind.

[ableguy]

I hope they get it screwed on straight.

I know quite a few that could use a head transplant.

The problem is that if it works, she won't be who she was. She will be someone else and no previous memories of her old life or self.

c

How do you know ??

[ableguy]

I hope he gets a head in life and not a behind.

Yes that would be the shits.

[cookee68]

will never work

[bofhman]

If successful he will be ahead of everyone else.

[Stray]

I hope they get it screwed on straight.

I know quite a few that could use a head transplant.

The problem is that if it works, she won't be who she was. She will be someone else and no previous memories of her old life or self.

It certainly would be a problem as Valery Spiridonov is a man.

[oneday]

...

I guess it’s just the publicity associated with attempting to reconnect a severed head. Well, those surgeons really better have their shit together. Lack of blood supply leading to onset of brain death occurs in just 2 mins.. Immediate onset of unconsciousness caused by lack of blood pressure occurs in just 15 seconds...

...

Actually, I don't think this would be a problem at all. They would just use a "Heart-Lung bypass" machine. As a matter of fact, now that I think about it, they would also need one for the donor body so they would need two of these machines while they are reconnecting everything.

Edited September 10, 2015 by oneday

[hugh2121]

Seems like a bridge too far to me. Sadly I don't believe he'll survive but hope he proves me wrong.