April 26, For Franck Dufourmantelle the word tattooed on his charred arm in English was like "a nod from destiny". The year-old French laboratory technician from the northern city of Amiens was given less than a one-percent chance of survival after a workplace accident in September , when a can of chemicals he was holding exploded, setting him ablaze.
The burns covered 95 percent of his body, sparing only his pubis, feet and faceβplus the prophetic tattoo, now framed by thick pink scars. Eighteen months later, thanks to skin grafts from his twin brother Eric, Franck has made a miraculous recovery and is set to give life himself, as an expectant father. While the skin is likely to be rejected it acts as a place-holder while new skin grows or doctors harvest skin from other parts of the body.
The doctors had only seen Franck's face when it was covered in bandages, so they couldn't see the resemblance.
It was Eric's insistence on helping, when all looked lost, that clinched the decision of surgeon Maurice Mimoun at Saint-Louis Hospital in Paris.
The advantage of a skin graft between identical twins is there is no chance of rejection, since they're genetically the same. But doctors had never carried out a twin-on-twin skin transplant over such a large area, with previous reported cases in the world ranging from six to 68 percent of the patient's body.
