A woman in Sweden has given birth to a baby boy using a transplanted womb, in a medical first
Early this year, nine women in Sweden had received uterus transplants in an experimental fertility project. The project even included a first live-donor uterus transplant from mother to child. A baby boy, was born prematurely last month , almost 32 weeks into the pregnancy. Both mum and first womb-transplant baby are now said to be doing well. The successful birth is the result of more than 15 years of research.
Pregnancy after New Womb, the @UniOfGothenburg Live-Donor Uterus Transplant Project, 2014
Nine women in Sweden have received uterus transplants from living relatives in an experimental fertility project. The patients in this trial headed by Mats Brannstrom of the University of Gothenburg are mostly women in their 30s who had lost their uterus to cancer or were born without one. The series of transplants took off in September 2012, with donors including the mothers and relatives of the recipients. These women will soon try to get pregnant, Brannstrom said in a CBS report. Video by TomoNews US, Published on 13 Feb 2014.
In this procedure, a radical hysterectomy is performed on the donor to remove the uterus, cervix and surrounding blood vessels, which will then be implanted to ensure adequate blood flow needed to sustain the uterus. Since the transplanted womb is not connected to the recipient’s fallopian tubes through which eggs are released, natural fertilisation cannot occur in the uterus. Instead, mature eggs will be extracted from the recipient and implanted to the uterus after performing in vitro fertilisation. When the uterus recipient has carried the fetus to full term, the baby is delivered by Caesarian section. The uterus recipient needs to remain on an extensive anti-rejection drug regimen, and the uterus is expected to be removed after a maximum of two pregnancies so the women can be taken off the anti-rejection drugs.
“Mats has done something amazing and we understand completely why he has taken this route, but we are wary of that approach,” said Dr. Richard Smith, head of the U.K. charity Womb Transplant UK. Smith is trying to raise 500,000 pounds ($823,000) to carry out five operations in Great Britain.
Two uterus transplants in Turkey and Saudi Arabia had failed to produce successful pregnancies. Similar procedures are currently under development in Hungary and the UK..
Dr. Mats Brannstrom led the team of doctors performing two mother-daughter uterine transplants in Sweden.
” Two Swedish women have received new wombs donated by their mothers in the first mother-to-daughter uterine transplants… … So far, the procedures have been a success, but the final proof of success will be the birth of a healthy child” said Dr. Michael Olausson, Surgeon and Professor.
Read First mother-daughter womb transplants performed in Sweden, CNN, September 20, 2012.
