telephone number

I was just wondering if anyone happened to have the phone number for the Childrens Hospital in St. Louis? I have been told by several people that they do the skin removal surgery free because they want the skin for the burn patients and for plastic sugery patients. Has anyone else heard anything like that? Also if anyone has that number if you could please get it to me i would like to call them and see if they could send me some information of it. Thanks in advance Cindy

Call information (1411) and ask for the phone number for Children's Hospital in St. Louis. I find alot of phone numbers doing that. Hope that helps. Penni

I have been told that there are NO hospitals that will do plastic surgery for free because they cannot use the skin they get. Something about how they have to harvest it for doing skin grafts is not compatible with how they remove it for plastic surgery. Please, please, please keep us informed and let us know if you find out different. Thanks, Wayne

Very interesting idea, Cindy. I went to the Children's Hospital of St Louis web site, to burn center, to skin donation only to find they are not accepting skin donations at this time. See http://www.stlouischildrens.org/default.aspx?tabid=96&acn=view&aid=1948 But they had another place to go http://www.aatb.org/aatbskinbank/index.htm. This site is a skin bank site. They have a list of skin banks in the U.S. along with phone numbers. I plan on calling some of these on Monday and seeing what this is all about. Might be help for those of us with bat wings and flappy thighs but no real medical reason to get insurance to pay for surgery. Wouldn't it be awesome if all this extra skin I've grown could be used to help a child. Hey, I could probably donate skin for two or three kids. I'll post again if I find anything out. Teresa

OK, here's what I found out . This is from www.applesforhealth.org/organdonation/cdestsb6.html In essence, the answer is no. They tell us why in this article. TP Can I Donate Excess Skin To A Skin Bank While visiting today be sure to visit the other healthy sections on applesforhealth.com. Click Here ------------------------------------------------------------------------    Q: I recently lost a great deal of weight and I have a lot of excess skin. Can I donate my excess skin to a skin bank to help burn patients?     Will a tissue bank pay for my skin reduction surgery if I agree to donate my tissue?    A:  These questions are asked quite often by individuals who have lost large amounts of weight and have excess skin folds. We appreciate your desire to donate. However, this kind of donation is unworkable. Allow me to explain why, and to give you an alternative.    Our tissue bank does not obtain skin from these patients for several reasons. First, this method of obtaining skin is cost prohibitive. The amount of transplantable tissue obtained from tissue reduction surgery is minimal when compared to the amount of tissue obtained from a cadaveric (deceased) tissue donor. The procurement costs would be much greater as it would require the services of doctors, nurses, anesthetists, and other health care professionals as well as the use of an operating room and other hospital services. Cadaveric donation requires only trained tissue recovery technicians, and they can procure tissue after the body has been sent to the morgue (rather than in an operating room), thus keeping expenses to a minimum.    Additionally, cadaveric donated tissue can be used for transplant soon after recovery (as soon as quality assurance testing is complete), but the FDA requires that tissues recovered from living donors must be placed into quarantine for six months. At the end of six months, all serologic testing (HIV and Hepatitis) must be repeated before that tissue can be used.    It is virtually impossible to obtain a skin graft from tissue than has been removed during tissue reduction surgery. The usual procedure for tissue reduction surgery involves the removal of skin and underlying attached tissues, but skin grafts used for transplant are only 15/1000 (0.015) of an inch thick and do not include these underlying tissues. Skin grafts for transplant are procured by the use of a surgical device called a dermatome, which peels off a very thin (0.015 inch), uniform layer of skin, and it only works on skin that is stretched taut over and firmly attached to muscles, such as in the back, arms, and legs. Very few people have an abdomen taut enough to permit skin tissue recovery. Skin folds (such as those removed when someone has lost a large amount of weight) lack the firm attachment to underlying tissues, and so the dermatome can't work properly.    I do not know of any tissue bank that would pay for a donor's tissue reduction surgical expenses for the purpose of obtaining skin for transplantation.  -- Information Provided  Tom Taddonio Director, University of Michigan Skin Bank All rights reserved.

IF YOU DIAL 314-362-5000 THAT IS THE MAIN SWITHBOARD FOR BARNES JEWISH AND CHILDRENS THEY CAN CONNECT YOU TO WHERE YOU NEED TO GO.