New hope for victim of chimp attack

• Tweet

BOSTON, May 11 (UPI) -- A Connecticut woman mauled by a chimpanzee is currently being tested at a Boston hospital to see whether she can undergo transplants, a surgeon says.

A top team at Brigham and Women's Hospital is determining whether Charla "Charlie" Nash, 57, is a candidate for life-changing face and hand transplants, the Boston Herald reported Tuesday.

"We need to figure out what's there, what's missing and what we would need to replace should it come to that," said Dr. Bohdan Pomahac, who headed the team that performed the nation's second face transplant last year.

Nash's hands, nose, lips and eyelids were torn off by a friend's 200-pound chimpanzee in February 2009.

She was taken to the Cleveland Clinic following the attack but Cleveland reportedly told her it couldn't manage a hand transplant.

"She's been losing hope and now I think we gave her hope," Pomahac said.