Hand Transplant Research

Although hand transplantation is clearly in the early stages of being considered a standard of care treatment for hand/upper extremity amputation, we sought the oversight of the Springfield Committee for Research Involving Human Subjects at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine to initiate a clinical trial of hand transplantation (IRB protocol # 12-811, final approval 10/17/2013).  We are currently recruiting patients for the SIU Hand Transplant Trial and are studying a number of outcomes.

Our Clinical Hand Transplant Research Interests

• Prevalence and distribution of potential vascularized composite allotransplant donors, implications for optimizing the donor-recipient match
• Functional MRI study of the re-organizing brain in hand amputees and hand transplant recipients in collaboration with University of Missouri Colombia and The Christine Kleinert Hand Institute
• Effect of early steroid withdrawal on acute rejection episodes in hand transplant patients
• Evaluating the outcomes—the quest for the best subjective and objective outcome measures in hand transplantation
• Use of a novel standardized photography method for optimizing donor-recipient match in hand transplantation
• Improvement in hand transplant surgical techniques including novel methods of bone osteotomy and osteosynthesis

Our Laboratory Hand Transplant Research Interests

• Induction of donor-specific tolerance in vascularized composite allotransplantation via upregulation of FoxP3+ alloprotective T regs
• Impact of early transition from Tacrolimus to Sirolimus on nerve regeneration in vascularized composite allotransplantation
• Ex-vivo modification of vascularized composite allografts using gene therapy, a potential avenue of tolerance induction
• Methods of reducing ischemia time and ischemia-reperfusion injury in vascularized composite allotransplantation

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