Girl Grows An Ear On Her Arm After Being Mauled By A Raccoon Attack

A girl named Charlotte Ponce grew an ear on her arm after being mauled during a raccoon attack. But how did such a thing happen?

In a related report by The Inquisitr, Charlotte is now 11 years old but when she was three months old she was left alone and brutally mauled by a raccoon, leaving her with no nose and missing an ear. The girl’s great-aunt and uncle, Sharon and Time Ponce, adopted the girl and her brother after the incident and this is how they described the injury:

“The raccoon pretty much ate the right side of her face, all the way back to the ear. Her right side is totally scarred and she’s had three surgeries to remove some of it almost two years ago.”

Over the years, Charlotte has had her nose, checks, and lips rebuilt through multiple surgeries. Just this week, a plastic surgeon named Dr. Kongkrit Chaiyasate explained how growing an ear on an arm could possibly help the child. The process involved shaping a new ear from cartilage pulled from Charlotte’s ribs. This cartilage was then implanted several months ago into her forearm in order to allow it to grow a layer of natural-looking skin. Now the ear will be removed from the arm and then attached to the side of the girl’s head.

Dr. Chaiyasate worked with Charlotte before in order to replace her nose. Growing an ear from an arm is not a new procedure, but plastic surgeons have only done so twice before in medical history. So far the doctor is pleased with the results of the newly grown ear:

“And you see I’m very pleased with the projection, you can see the ear here. Once we release it, you’ll see a lot of projection when I release the scar, the whole tissue is going to be moved up to her head.”

The only major difficulty is integrating the new ear with Charlotte’s head. Right now she only has a hole through which she can still hear sound. The surgery will take six to eight hours and the hardest part is integrating the new ear to the shape of her hole so it doesn’t stick flat to her skull and so she can wear glasses:

“The measurements have to match the other ear. It has to have the same angle, the same degree of rotation and projection.”

The doctor also plans on creating a new ear lob so Charlotte can wear earrings.

Unfortunately, the girl’s surgeries are not over since she will need some fine-tuning in order to make everything appear natural. The last step in the process will be when Charlotte Ponce is fully grown and she will finally undergo her last plastic surgery by receiving laser treatments to remove the scars left by the raccoon attack.