Inside a Boston nursing home, Charla Nash, the woman who was nearly eaten to death by a rampaging chimpanzee, picked a 20-foot spot on the floor and walked, step by step, hour by hour, to get ready for a surgery that would replace her face and hands.
“She wanted to be physically fit,” said her brother, Steve Nash. “So she would just walk back and forth. She’d do that 100 times. Then I’d come up and she’d tire me out. We’d go to the box stores, grocery stores and walk up and down the aisle. It kept her going. . . . She had to be able to endure the surgery.”
Doctors at Brigham and Women’s Hospital announced yesterday that Nash underwent a full-face transplant last month in a 20-hour operation that involved a team of 30 doctors, nurses and anesthesiologists that replaced nose, lips, skin, muscles and nerves with a donated face.
“We have provided something that is ultimately going to turn into a very functional face,” said lead surgeon Dr. Bohdan Pomahac. “There will be an excellent return of motor function, so she could eat, smell and express her emotions and feel the face.”
The new look was jarring the first time he saw it, Steve Nash said.
“I was outside the room, not realizing it was her. It was hard,” he said. “Each minute that passed, each time I came in, I was more accepting, and now, it’s her.”
Doctors also replaced Charla Nash’s hands, but she developed pneumonia, sepsis set in and surgeons had to remove both.
Nash was nearly killed in February 2009 by a friend’s 200-pound pet chimp in Stamford, Conn. The chimp beat her unconscious, tore her face to pieces and ate her hands. The family’s suit against the estate of the owner and the state of Connecticut is pending, her lawyers said yesterday.
Stamford police officer Frank Chiafari, who shot the beast to death, was thrilled yesterday to learn of Nash’s step toward recovery, according to a statement he gave his union.
“He’s extremely happy regarding this news,” said Stamford Police Association President Joseph Kennedy. “It makes him feel everything he went through was worthwhile, and he’s extremely happy that everything has progressed so positively with Charla.”
The procedure was the third full-face transplant at the Brigham.
Steve Nash’s wife, Kate, said the transformation is nothing short of magical.
“She has a beautiful nose, little mouth. She has nice high cheek bones and dark hair. She looks like Suzanne Somers today because they put her hair in a ponytail,” she said.
One day, Steve Nash said, his sister wants to go outside without a veil.
“She accepted the cards that were dealt,” he said. “Obviously, she’s not pleased, but she’s thankful to be alive. We put those things behind us and look forward to the future, and a bright future, and everything that’s good about the future. That’s the way we handle it.”
