By Jon Herskovitz
AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – A man whose cancer left him with severe damage to the top of the head has received what his doctors in Houston describe as the first skull and scalp transplant, the MD Anderson Cancer Center said on Thursday.
James Boysen, a 55-year-old software developer from Austin, received the craniofacial tissue transplant at the same time as a kidney and pancreas transplant at Houston Methodist Hospital on May 22 in surgeries that lasted nearly a day, it said. 
“For this patient, it means a new lease on life,” said Jesse Selber, a reconstructive plastic surgeon who was the co-leader of the team that performed the intricate surgery.
“He had series of cancers of the scalp and skull that were treated with various surgeries and radiation that left him with a large wound that was all the way down to his brain,” Selber said.