A medical marvel in the field of medicine has given hopes to parents WO fail to have a baby dueto problemsbeyond control. This September has been a blessed with a baby boy in an amazing way. A Sweden mother who refuses to release her identity is a 36 years old woman who was born without the uterus. She received donated womb from a 60 year old friend. The British Journal says that this September the first babyboy was born in the world using a transplanted womb. The weight of the baby was 1.8kg at the time of birth.
Earlier day’s surrogacy was the only option for woman who had birth defects or cancer and was left without a functioning womb. They failed to have a baby of their own. But this finding and its result in Sweden has opened the doors of hope for many woman
There have been nine cases of transplanted womb but the first delivery was in Sweden. In these cases the woman is born with a congenital disorder which prevents the womb from developing. It does not have any impact on the ovaries. The Sweden woman was born without the womb.
Mr Smith, a consultant gynaecological surgeon, described the Swedish case of womb transplant as ‘amazing’ and believes a successful birth would bring over similar projects around the world. The doctors transplanted awomb after implanting an embryo into her body. The baby is similar to other born through normal procedure.
Procedure of the womb transplant
The Sweden couple had to go through IVF to produce 11 embryos which were kept frozen The womb was taken from a 61 year old woman who had menopause seven years back and was transplanted in the other woman’s body. Many drugs were given to suppress the immune system to prevent the womb from being rejected. After one year of transplant the doctors decided to implant one of the frozen embryos and they succeeded in the pregnancy. The baby was born in 32 weeks of pregnancy. The mother developed pre-eclampsia and the baby’s heart rate became abnormal. Caesarean was the only option which was successfully performed and the mother and baby are both doing well so far.
There have been two other teams who tried womb transplant earlier but failed as in one the transplanted organ became diseases and in the second miscarriage took place.
Prof Mats Brannstrom, who led the transplant team in Sweden were thrilled at the birth of the baby as the whole team could not believe that they have reached the moment of their success. The whole team was admitting that the success is based on over 10 years of intensive animal research. The team feels there is a possibility of treating many young ladies who suffer from uterine infertility. It gives hope to those women and men who had given up hopes to have a child
Apprehensions of the procedure
The success of this transplant has given a silver lining to many, but there are still doubts about the effectiveness and safety of this procedure. There are more eight couples under Dr Brannstrom and his team. The results of these pregnancies will reveal a better picture of the technique.
This transplanted womb can work for just one or two pregnancies, after that it will have to be removed.
The biggest concern of the doctors is that how well the transplanted womb will take the strains of pregnancy in which it is expected to swell from a pear size to a melon size to accommodate the baby.
