Doctors in the United States have performed the world’s first penis and scrotum transplant, performing the surgery on a US military sergeant severely injured several years ago in an IED blast in Afghanistan.

The man, whose name was not given, is recovering well and expected to regain both urinary and sexual function, said Richard Redett, who led the transplant team.

He told a press conference on Monday in Baltimore, where the team at Johns Hopkins hospital worked, that the patient underwent 14 hours of surgery in late March.

It is not the world’s first penis transplant – that was carried out in 2014 in South Africa – and nor is it the first in the US. That was in 2016 at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

It is, however, the most significant transplant to date.