Medical treatment, particularly surgery, has made astonishing advances over the years. Surgeons at the Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, Texas, have performed four womb transplants from live donors, one of which was successful.
This technique can help women who are born without a uterus or who lost it to disease or have a damaged uterus, a chance at pregnancy.
Dr. Tomer Singer, a reproductive endocrinologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, said this new procedure would allow “women to carry their own genetic child without the use of a gestational carrier (surrogate), which can be financially and emotionally taxing.”
This transplant trial “opens the door to an innovative and promising advancement within reproductive medicine,” he added. “We believe that tens of thousands of women will benefit from this advancement in the future, while realizing that there are still challenges to overcome before we offer this procedure routinely.”
The procedure involved transferring the uterus, as well as a part of the vagina from a living donor to the recipient. After that, surgeons connected blood vessels to it, so that it can get blood supply and the body can adjust itself to the newly attached organ.
However, in this procedure, the egg would be fertilized outside of the body and then implanted into the new uterus. Moreover as the transplanted uterus will not be as durable as a natural one, the delivery of the baby would have to be via C-section.
