Ömer Özkan

Ömer Özkan (born December 31, 1971) is a Turkish plastic surgeon. An associate professor at the Akdeniz University in Antalya, he led the team that performed in 2012 the first full face transplant in Turkey.

Education He studied at Cumhuriyet High School in Ankara, Turkey. After graduating from the Faculty of Medicine at the Hacettepe University in 1995, he completed his special studies in plastic and reconstructive surgery between 1995 and 2001 at the same university.

Ömer Özkan served in 2004 as a research fellow at the Tokyo University in Japan in perforator flap and super microsurgery and later at the I-Shou University in Kaohsiung, Republic of China (Taiwan) in plastic surgery and hand surgery for a period of six months each. In 2006, he spent three months at the Bogenhausen Clinic of the Munich Technical University, Germany on a fellowship granted by the European Association of Plastic Surgeons (EURAPS).

On September 25, 2010, two arms of 23-year-old Fatih Demirel, who died in a motorcycle accident in Milas, Muğla Province, were transplanted to Cihan Topal (29). Topal lost in 2008 his both arms below elbow as the corn harvester caught his upper limbs.

The second transplant was simultaneously carried out in another operating room on Atilla Kavdır, who at the age of eleven had lost both his arms and one leg following an electric shock as he contacted overhead lines while trying to chase away birds with a metal stick. His transplanted right leg had to be amputated, however, one day later due to capillary immunity complication while his transplanted two arms showed no problem. The donor for both transplants was Ahmet Kaya, who, hit by a train in Uşak, died on January 20 at the age of 39. Ömer Özcan personally collected the necessary organs from Uşak, and took them to Antalya on board an aircraft belonging to the Ministry of Health.

Family life He is married to Özlenen Özkan, who is a docent at the same institute. The couple has two daughters, Zeynep Lara called "Zeynoş" and Lidya Naz.

Awards 2002 "Junior Basic Science Prize" at the Scientific Essay Contest, Plastic Surgery Educational Foundation (PSEF).