The Plastic Surgery Foundation
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Grants We Funded

Grant applicants for the 2023 cycle requested a total of nearly $4 million dollars. The PSF Study Section Subcommittees of Basic & Translational Research and Clinical Research evaluated nearly 140 grant applications on the following topics:

The PSF awarded research grants totaling over $1 million dollars to support nearly 30 plastic surgery research proposals.

ASPS/PSF leadership is committed to continuing to provide high levels of investigator-initiated research support to ensure that plastic surgeons have the needed research resources to be pioneers and innovators in advancing the practice of medicine.

Research Abstracts

Search The PSF database to have easy access to full-text grant abstracts from past PSF-funded research projects 2003 to present. All abstracts are the work of the Principal Investigators and were retrieved from their PSF grant applications. Several different filters may be applied to locate abstracts specific to a particular focus area or PSF funding mechanism.

Evaluation of Functional Outcome in Composite Tissue Allotransplantation

Principal Investigator
Kia Washington MD

Year
2007

Institution
University of Pittsburgh

Funding Mechanism
Research Fellowship

Focus Area
Composite Tissue Allotransplantation

Abstract
Composite Tissue Allotransplantation (CTA) presents a viable option for reconstructing difficult defects resulting from traumatic injury, congenital deformities, and surgical extirpation. The main obstacles to the wide spread application of CTA are overcoming the risks associated with systemic immunosuppression and obtaining consistent and optimal functional outcome. In 2003, W.P. Andrew Lee investigated the functional outcome of nearly all of the hand transplant patients in the world. Motor function was good enough to perform daily tasks in most patients and sensory outcome was inconsistent. One patient described no sensation nearly a year after transplant, while another claimed he had sensation almost immediately, with actual cortical activity on functional MRI. (Lee in press) Similarly, the first face transplant has shown promising results, with reported sensation on her entire allograft, and some cortical activity on functional MRI. Her motor function however has been slower to recover. (Devauchalle 2006) Although these results are promising, the experience thus far has shown variable and inconsistent functional outcome in CT A. Thus, there is still a need for well-designed animal models to explore functional outcome in CT A. My overall goal for my next research year is to study functional outcome in Composite Tissue Allotransplantation using the rat hemi-face transplant model.