Lessya Kotelevskaya attends a news conference in Louisville, Kentucky. Photo: AP
Louisville: A US medical team has painstakingly repaired the disfiguring injuries to a woman’s face, caused by radiation treatments for a cancer she never had that caused a gaping hole in her cheek and made her an outcast in a former Soviet republic.
Lessya Kotelevskaya was recovering on Tuesday following the 16-hour surgery the day before at University of Louisville Hospital.
Her surgeon, Dr Jarrod Little, said the procedure to reconstruct her jawbone and cheek went according to plan.
Dr Jarrod Little speaks at a news conference, showing images of Lessya Kotelevskaya’s injuries. Photo: AP
“Lessya cannot wait to get back to her normal life,” her cousin, Oleg Sennik, told reporters.