Name: Dave Meets The First Double Arm Transplant Recipient | Letterman
Uploaded: 2024-04-24T15:00:28.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dave Meets The First Double Arm Transplant Recipient | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-24. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dave Meets The First Double Arm Transplant Recipient | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-24. Transcript available.

Our next guest is a former Army sergeant and the first combat veteran in
history to receive a double arm transplant.
He is joined by the renowned doctor who led a team of 16 surgeons in performing
the remarkable procedure.
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome former U.S. Sergeant Brendan Morocco and
Dr. W.P. Andrew Lee.
Gentlemen.
Brendan, this is, thank you very much.
It's a remarkable story and thank you for sharing it with us tonight and
helping us tell this story.
You're from Staten Island, is that right?
Yep, born and raised in Staten Island.
And when did you join the military and was it in the Army?
Yeah, I joined the Army in, I signed my paperwork in 2007, December.
Was your family a military family?
No, not at all. It was pretty much just me.
And what was the motivation to sign up?
I just always wanted to and I've been putting it off and putting it off ever
since I was, you know, getting out of high school and then finally decided to
go do it.
And it was definitely the absolute best thing I've probably ever done in my
life.
It's amazing that you can say that considering the circumstances.
Yeah, I mean, I pretty much knew what I was getting into.
I knew we were fighting a war at the time and still are and I knew what the
outcome could have been.
What happened and when did it happen? Where did it happen?
April 12th, 2009, just on a pretty much a routine mission, just taking somebody
over to a different base and got blown up on the way back.
Is this one of the IEDs that we hear about frequently?
Yeah, yeah, pretty much just a roadside bomb went through the truck.
And these things seem to be omnipresent is my impression from talking to men
and women who have been overseas.
A lot of them, yeah.
And they've gotten to a point, they're very sophisticated now, aren't they?
They are.
Pretty much what hit me was an anti-armor IED that went through the door of my
truck and out the other side of the truck.
Was it an armored vehicle you were in?
Yeah, it was an Emirat.
And still it went through one side and out the other side.
And did you, do you remember being hit?
What do you remember?
No, I mean, I remember the flash and waking up at the hospital back in the
States.
What period of time passed between the flash and the waking up?
Honestly, I'm not really sure.
Months?
No, no, not that.
Probably just a couple of days.
A couple of days.
The other thing that has impressed me with our military and with this last two
conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan
is how people can be significantly injured, beyond hope in some cases,
and then are taken out immediately to a hospital and back to the United States
and recover.
Has this recovery rate, we certainly know of the mortality rate,
but has this recovery rate never been higher?
I think so.
From what I see at the hospital down at Walter Reed,
they're the best staff for dealing with people like me
or just anyone else who's injured, really.
The government has put so much money into training doctors and surgeons and
nurses
that from the point you get injured, you're in probably the best care in the
world.
Yes.
I'm thinking, like, Vietnam, if this injury had happened to you in Vietnam,
probably not the same outcome.
There's no way.
Yeah.
No way.
Because I was the first quadruple amputee ever to survive.
Wow.
So you come to, you're in Walter Reed down in Maryland, just outside of
Washington, D.C.
What are you aware of then?
All I was really aware of was the pain.
It was really pretty bad.
And just over time became more aware of what happened and what went on and just
kind of accepted it.
There was no really being upset for myself.
It was just always wanting to push forward and get better.
In a situation like this, how long does the human mechanism remain in shock?
You're really probably asking the wrong person.
I really don't know how long that was happening.
Was there a point where you made the assessment of your injuries and said, well,
you know what?
I'm still happy to be alive.
Absolutely.
From day one, I was really glad and blessed to be still around.
Like you had said before, it would happen any other time, I wouldn't have been.
Right.
Was there, before the transplant, was there any rehab?
Yeah, I was doing hours of rehab a day.
Pretty much for two years straight, therapy every day, working with prosthetics
and prosthetic legs as well.
And how far along had you come with that?
Were you thinking, all right, this represents the rest of my life, it's going
to be good?
When it came to the arms, that was never the case.
You know, I always wanted real arms.
From the second that I was told that it could happen, I was all in.
You know, it was all that I cared about when it came to the arms.
Because using prosthetics, they're more tools.
You don't have any of the feeling or anything like that.
And when you said you were told the possibility of a transplant, who told you
that?
Because it's certainly nothing I had ever heard.
Right now, he's the commandant of the Marine Corps, General Amos.
He came to me, saw me at the hospital, asked if I'd be interested.
And of course, you know, we did.
And then a couple weeks later, we had a meeting with Dr. Lee here.
And from there, it was just testing and finally finding out that I'm a good
candidate for it.
And a couple years later, we had to set arms.
This is, Dr. Lee, this is beyond a miracle?
Well, thank you.
It's still a relatively rare procedure.
In fact, our team has performed four of the only six double hand transplants in
the U.S.
Brendan had the most extensive hand transplant in terms of the arm tissues that
were transplanted.
For his right arm, we transplanted the arm from the donor above the elbow.
And for the left arm, in order to preserve his only remaining elbow joint,
we took the entire forearm from the donor and transplanted them on top of his
existing forearm bone.
Boy, you make it sound so easy.
Oh, you only took 13 hours.
You know, he just sips them together and we're good to go.
We'll take a break.
And when we come back, more detail and give us an update
and an overall evaluation of this remarkable story.
We'll be right back, ladies and gentlemen.
I was told that it was 90 hours from your accident for the attack, the bomb,
90 hours between then and when you came to Walter Reed.
Okay.
Yeah, that's just remarkable.
So, again, you worked on this.
Who, by the way, gives you the go-ahead?
Who says, yes, double arm transplant?
Sure, let's give that a try.
Well, we have an institution review board at Johns Hopkins.
They reviewed our protocol, our proposal.
We answered all their questions.
They gave us approval.
But we also received funding from the Department of Defense.
This type of procedure is not covered by the insurance company currently.
So we received a research grant from the Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative
Medicine
from DOD that made this transplant possible.
How long have you had these arms?
Just about 14 months.
You know, I'm sitting here, and I sit here next to people every night,
and you are doing with your arms what everybody else that I have sat next to
does with their arms.
That started pretty early.
Is that right?
It did.
I was even doing it with prosthetics.
But now it's just a little more rewarding.
Yes.
16 surgeons, is that how many were on the team?
16 surgeons.
We started out with four surgical teams working simultaneously at the beginning
of the operation,
and we had to connect the bones, muscles, blood vessels, nerves, and skin.
Yeah.
And to what extent are they reconnected?
Is it 90% we've connected them, 100% we've connected them?
Well, they had to be completely connected.
In fact, we were working under a time clock because there was only so much time
tissues can be without blood supply.
So not only did we have to be precise in what we did,
we also had to do it fairly efficiently.
And you will now continue using the prosthetic legs, is that correct?
Yeah, I'm currently staying down at Walter Reed to go about that along with the
hand therapy.
So it wouldn't be uncommon then in the next six months to see you walking the
streets of New York?
It would not.
Yeah.
That's just remarkable.
I think we have a picture here, a photo, if we could take a look at the
photograph and see.
What is going on here?
That was me going through my driving class probably a couple weeks ago, really.
How's that going?
Great.
I have like two sessions left, and then I'm driving.
And you're a cab driver.
Could the same surgery be performed for Brendan regarding legs, or is that
beyond what we can do now?
It's a situation, isn't it?
It's actually the same situation.
It's a little bit into the future.
We think more research is needed.
The distance for the nerves to grow will be much longer in the legs than the
arm.
And what is, excuse me for talking about you like you're not here, but what is
your prognosis for him?
Brendan has made a great deal of progress in just 14 months, and we think he
will continue to make great strides.
It'll be at least three to four years before he will maximize his strength, his
dexterity.
So we have great hopes for him.
And this recovery, the procedure, and what caused the injury, all of that
together is unprecedented?
Well, as we said, there have been very few double hand or arm transplants so
far.
And we're discovering new things as we do surgery as patients recover.
Well, this is beyond wonderful, and I'm so happy that they are able to give
back to you for what you lost.
Me too.
Yeah.
Now, you were at the Daytona 500 last week.
I was, I was.
What was going on at the Daytona 500?
I was asked to be the race dedicatee, is that the right word?
Dedicated?
Kurt Busch dedicated the race to me.
There you go.
So Kurt and the Armed Forces Foundation, excuse me, had me down there with one
of my buddies.
And we were, we were in the, the starting grid and they're doing the, the
opening ceremony for the race.
And they're, they're singing the national anthem.
And all of a sudden I, I realized to, to myself that I have my, I'm holding my
hand over my heart.
And it's pretty much like the, completely just zoned out at that point.
And I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
Absolutely.
And I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
And I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
And I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
And I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
It's very cool.
I'm just thinking, how cool is this?
It is very cool.
And since your home is Staten Island, and as you progress and things change in
your life
and get better and better, please come back and visit with us.
I would love to.
I'll do donuts down in the driveway.
Former U.S. Sergeant Brendan Morocco, and Dr. W.P. Andrew Lee.
Thank you very much.
We'll be right back with Future Islands, everybody.