US firefighter gets world's most extensive face transplant

Volunteer firefighter Patrick Hardison, 41, of Senatobia, Mississippi (R) poses with Dr. Eduardo D. Rodriguez who led a team of more than 100 physicians, nurses, technical and support staff, after recovery from face transplant surgery in this undated handout provided by NYU Langone Medical Center in New York, November 16, 2015.  [Photo/Agencies]

The team slit the skin at the back of the donor's head, peeling each side forward with key pieces of bone attached at the chin, nose and cheekbone and then precisely draped it, like Batman's cowl, onto Hardison's head.

"Everything has to be perfectly positioned," Rodriguez told Reuters, including the bones, muscles, ear canals, lips and nerves.

NYU, which will pay for the estimated $1 million surgery, took the case after a firefighter buddy reached out on behalf of Hardison, whose own children were initially terrified of their father's disfigured face.

Proof of the surgery's success was obvious after a medical team took Hardison shopping for new clothes at Macy's this fall, and no one in the store gave him a second look, Rodriguez said.

Rodebaugh's mother, who gave permission for the transplant, noting her son was an unexpected gift after she had been told she could not conceive a child, recently was shown a photograph of the surgical results.

"Patrick is beautiful," she told the medical team.

Hardison in a statement thanked his donor's family, saying,

"I hope they see in me the goodness of their decision."