“I’ll donate my organs in return for getting pretty”

Hatice Nergis, the third Turkish person to receive a face transplant, said she also wishes to donate her organs, in her first appearance before the media, on Wednesday.

“I would like to offer my condolences to the family of the donor. I would also like to donate my organs. Donating organs saves lives. It saved my life, and I would like to save the lives of others,” Nergis said at a press conference on Wednesday afternoon.

“What can I say,” she told the journalists gathered before her, “I am happy. I am more beautiful now.”Nergis saw her new face for the first time on March 29 and said she liked it after her operation on March 17.

“When I looked at myself in the mirror for the first time, I was a little shocked. I liked my entire face, but my nose the best. I was not expecting it to look this nice,” Nergis said. “I would like to thank my doctors.”

Nergis has reportedly said she would not have dared to undergo such a difficult operation if she had not had confidence in the team of surgeons.

The 20-year-old woman from Kahramanmaras had experienced severe tissue loss to her nose, chin, palate and upper lip after being shot six years ago. Her donor was a 28-year-old woman who died on March 16 in Istanbul.

Professor Omer Ozkan and his team from Akdeniz University performed Turkey’s first full-face transplant in January. The Ankara-based Hacettepe University School of Medicine Hospital last month successfully performed Turkey’s second full-face transplant surgery on a 25-year-old patient, who suffered burns to 70 percent of his face when he was 2 years old. <Cihan News Agency>

news@theasian.asia