Facial Reconstructive Surgery on Bear Attack Victim

(the following is a transcript of the above video)

A.H. – I hardly know where to begin. One moment I was working on my ranch and the next moment I had my head inside of a bear’s mouth.

D.K.L. – I first met A.H. when she was airlifted to UCLA Medical Center as a trauma patient right after her bear attack. I didn’t know her name. I didn’t know who she was. I didn’t know what she did and I had no clue what she looked like before this attack.

The bear had nearly ripped AH’s entire face off.

A.H. – And she not only put me back together, she put me back together in recognizable form. Words don’t come.  I think she’s a genius. I think she’s an artist of the highest order. As a person, I’m just very grateful that she was the person that met me.

D.K.L. – When I operate, I always go in with a really optimistic viewpoint. There was no point in time in the surgery where I thought that this wasn’t going to work or she wasn’t going to survive. All I could think of was this is a person that I’ve gotta put back together. If this were me, I’m gonna put all of my efforts there to make her look the best that she possibly can. I think being a woman, it’s just something that I see another woman go through and you won’t really want to help her.

D.K.M. performed more than half a dozen surgeries on A.H. following the bear attack.

D.K.L. – In my private practice, I do about eighty percent cosmetic surgery and about twenty percent reconstructive surgery. I think the reconstructive aspect is actually key to improving your abilities as a cosmetic surgeon because it’s the understanding of the underlying structures that’s really key to serving as a foundation for the outer surgery that you perform on the soft tissue or on the skin. It’s not just the outer shell. I think to get a great result, you need to understand the anatomy. You need to understand all of the underlying structures to get outstanding results.

A.H. – Doctor K.L was amazing in that she managed to make me look soft again, which considering how harsh my look was, I think is miraculous.

D.K.L. – As a facial plastic surgeon, I want my patients to have that self confidence and for A.H. in particular to feel like she’s a normal person again and that people don’t look at her differently. That’s really where the gratification comes from.

Whithout even know what A.H. looked like prior to the bear attack, D.K.M. was able to reconstruct her face into recognizable form.

A.H. – About three weeks in, I felt well enough to put on a hat and a pair of sunglasses and go out to pick up some supplies. And for the first time in two years, I felt ordinary. I was completely anonymous. I slipped in and out of stores and nobody stared and it was just such a relief to realize that it’s over. I’m still here. It’s me. I recognize myself as A.H. when I look in a mirror. I see myself and it’s comforting to know that I’m back.