DISQUS

Tom_Craver · 7 months ago

I had a similar idea for repairing limbs amputuated due to extreme damage - amputuate, but keep them alive, performing repeated surgeries to help put them back into shape - giving them time to heal. It would allow more aggressive measures to be taken than could be done with the limbs attached, and reduces risks to the patient - gangrene and blood clots for example.

I think there's been a bias against this - it seems distastefully "mad scientist-like" - Thanks, Mary Shelley! :-) . If nothing else, it would have long ago made sense to keep alive body parts donated for medical research. Without the Frankenstein bias, we might by now be commonly healing badly damaged limbs and reattaching them.

Once past the bias, this could lead to a better method of treating cancer. If cancer is detected in an organ, it might be immediately removed and kept alive, in hopes of both preventing the cancer from spreading, and being able to treat the cancer more aggressively outside the body.