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A black man who received a penis transplant is to have it tattooed in a world first - because the donor was white.

The 40-year-old lost his organ after a botched traditional circumcision and underwent the transplant as the third person ever to undergo the procedure.

But in the next six months, he will be able to have sex and urinate standing up for the first time in seventeen years.

The South African team who carried out the surgery revealed there was just one issue to resolve - which they delicately described as "a colour discrepancy."

(Image: Stellenbosch Uni/SWNS.COM)

Professor Andre van der Merwe said: "The patient is black, and the donor was white.

"We have very few donors for this transplant procedure. But that is the only issue left.

"He is certainly one of the happiest patients we have seen in our ward.

"He is doing remarkably well.

(Image: Stellenbosch Uni/SWNS.COM)

"There are no signs of rejection and all the reconnected structures seem to be healing well.

"The patient is expected to regain all urinary and reproductive functions of the organ within six months of the transplant.

"A colour discrepancy between the recipient and the donor organ will be corrected with medical tattooing between six to eight months after the operation."

The professor added: "The penis is working well, he can get erections already.

(Image: Stellenbosch Uni/SWNS.COM)

"The man had been in relationships before, but whenever the question of sex arose, he bailed out. That will no longer be a problem.

"He had been suffering with depression beforehand, and was even suicidal.

"We hope the rest of the world will catch on to the need for the operation."

Team member Dr Alexander Zuhlke explained the tattooing can be applied in the case of penis transplants - just like it is for nipples after a mastectomy, for instance.

But it should be performed by a tattooist specialising in medical tattooing and will require multiple visits.

(Image: INTERNET UNKNOWN)

However, until now there was no experience with such a procedure, since it had not been needed in the other two transplant cases.

Prof Van der Merwe, a urologist at Stellenbosch University, Western Cape, said the patient was now "doing extremely well, both physically and mentally."

"He is living a normal life. His urinary and sexual functions have returned to normal, and he has virtually forgotten he had a transplant."

But the biggest challenge remained organ donation and Prof Van der Merwe said: "I think the lack of penis transplants across the world since we performed the first one in 2014, is mostly due to a lack of donors.

"It might be easier to donate organs that you cannot see, like a kidney, than something like a hand or a penis."

In South Africa, penis mutilation is more common than other parts of the world because of complications in ritual ceremonies.

In certain rural cultures in the country, there are several cases of botched circumcisions.

It was the reason for Prof Merwe's original groundbreaking operation two-and-a-half years ago and the latest transplant operation took nine-and-a-half hours.

One study reported up to 55 cases of penis mutilations in the Eastern Cape alone.

(Image: Stellenbosch Uni/SWNS.COM)

Experts estimate that as many as 250 partial and total amputations take place across South Africa every year, with suicides also being reported.

Prof Van der Meuwe said the latest operation was trickier than the first, because the man had smaller blood vessels.

He added: "We are very thankful it went so well. There were a lot of things that could have gone wrong."

The procedure was part of a proof of concept study to develop a cost-effective penis transplant procedure that could be performed in a typical theatre setting in a South African public sector hospital.

By applying lessons learnt from the first transplant, the team significantly cut the costs of the second.

Only one other similar operation has been carried out before, at Massachusetts General Hospital last year.

Dr Nomafrench Mbombo, Western Cape health minister, said: "Traditional circumcision has claimed many young lives in South Africa.

"For this patient, life will never be the same again."

The entire penis was carefully dissected from the donor to keep blood vessels, nerves and other connecting structures intact.

These were marked and connected to the recipient's correlating tissue during the transplant.

The surgeons connected three vessels to ensure sufficient blood flow to the transplanted organ, and two nerves to restore sensation which enables the recipient to urinate through the penis and obtain an erection.

The study was published in the Journal of Materials Science.