Surgeon gives TV presenter Katie Piper a new face

A plastic surgeon has revealed for the first time how he saved the face of a model and TV presenter who was attacked with acid.

Mohammad Ali Jawad, 51, was the first to use a pioneering technique to rebuild the skin of a fresh burns victim.

A team of eight doctors from Chelsea and Westminster hospital took six hours to operate on Katie Piper in the first procedure of its kind in the world.

Ms Piper, 26, was left disfigured after her jealous ex-boyfriend Daniel Lynch hired a man to maim her. The sulphuric acid he threw at Ms Piper stripped away four layers of skin in the worst case of acid burns her doctors had seen.

Eighteen months later, she is making good progress thanks to the hospital's burns unit, which treats about 600 people a year. In his first interview, Mr Jawad told of the emotional impact of seeing Ms Piper's injuries: "It broke my heart when I saw Katie. She was so young and was there through no fault of her own." He added that the first concern had been whether was it was an alkaline burn which is worse than acid because it goes deeper and carries on "sizzling" the skin.

The treatment used by Mr Jawad involved a skin substitute or filler called Matriderm made of collagen and elastin. It is usually used by doctors as a "scaffolding" or "foundation" which improves the way the skin "accepts" skins grafts.

Until Ms Piper's operation, it had only been used to improve the appearance of existing burns, never on a patient with fresh injuries. Mr Jawad consulted surgeons around the world on the process. Facial operations are complex because patients need to retain their ability to use the face to express emotion, he said.

Mr Jawad said: "Treatments attempted in the past would not have left a facial expression. It was an even bigger dilemma when we found out she was a model." A layer of the filler, costing about £2,000 for an A4 sheet, was moulded over Ms Piper's face. The surgeons then used a graft of skin taken from her lower back. This was placed on top of the filler and stitched in place. The burns expert and plastic surgeon said he has since carried out the same procedure on at least 15 patients. Doctors in France, Spain and Italy have started using it after Mr Jawad's success.

Mr Jawad said: "There is no glamour in burns surgery. Breast reconstruction [for cancer patients] is a big deal now, but burns victims are often overlooked."

Katie: My Beautiful Face documents Ms Piper's recovery and highlights the plight of burns victims. It will be broadcast on Thursday at 9pm on Channel 4.