Woodland Hills : 7-Year-Old to Undergo Second Smile Surgery

She passed the dreaded blood test and she’s fever-blister free so all systems are go for 7-year-old Chelsey Thomas, who is scheduled today to undergo a second daylong round of surgery that will literally put a smile on her face.

Chelsey, of Palmdale, was born with a rare medical condition, known as Moebius syndrome, that causes partial paralysis of the facial muscles. As a result, Chelsey has never been able to smile. It didn’t bother her until about a year ago, when kids started teasing the physically active second-grader about her looks.

When her parents learned that the expensive and lengthy microvascular surgeries required to correct the condition were covered under their insurance policy, Chelsey’s dream of someday smiling became a reality.

But in November, just before her first scheduled surgery at the Kaiser Permanente Woodland Hills Medical Center, doctors noticed a small fever blister on her upper lip. The virus jeopardized the success of the delicate surgery, which takes place under microscopes with tiny instruments--some thinner than a single strand of hair. The surgery was postponed.

Doctors waited a month and tried again. In February, Chelsey felt the new facial nerve and muscle, transplanted from her thigh to her left cheek, quiver for the first time. By March, she had developed what her mother, Lori, called a “half smile.”

Today, surgeons plan to operate on the right side of Chelsey’s face, extracting another muscle and nerve from her thigh and transplanting them into her cheek.

“She passed her blood test--which she dreaded--and she’s a little more nervous than she was last time,” Lori Thomas said Monday. “But she’s in a pretty good mood,” she said, adding that doctors had prescribed antiviral medicine to prevent last-minute fever blisters.

Chelsey is expected to spend up to a week in the hospital after the surgery.

“We’re right on schedule,” Thomas said. “If all goes well, Chelsey should be smiling right around her 8th birthday” in June.