Boy Gets Rare Toe-To-Hand Transplant

Three year old Vaughn Washington lost his right thumb when it was duct-taped in an effort to prevent him from sucking it. Because the thumb provides half of the function of the hand, Drs. Michel Saint-Cyr and Sean Bidic of UT Southwestern Medical Center recently moved Vaughn’s second right toe to his missing right thumb area. Because it was his own tissue being transplanted Vaughn will not need immunosuppressive drugs to keep the body from rejecting it.