Imagine my surprize this afternoon to see a possible fertility milestone reported on the front page of my local paper. I was waiting for my sushi to go order and was passing the time reading their donated newspaper. The headline “Uterus transplant may enable pregnancy” grabbed my eyes. To read the full article on Yahoo click here.
The transplanting of a uterus has been tried before in a woman only once. The transplanted uterus had to be removed three months later due to a blood clot. Uterus transplants have also bee attempted in rodents, rabbits, pigs and recently a failed attempt in a monkey. The article says that only live births have occured in the mice.
If the transplant goes forth in a human woman, this is how the procedure might go:
A uterus stays viable for about 12 hours, so the recipient would need to be ready for surgery once the retrieval begins.
The transplant would be through a vertical cut about 6 inches long, from the belly button to the pubic bone. The woman would need to be stable on anti-rejection drugs for at least three months before pregnancy would be attempted.
Then, previously frozen embryos would be transferred to the new womb in the usual manner through the vagina.
At the end of the pregnancy, the baby would be delivered by C-section and the transplanted uterus would then also be removed. This would save the woman from having to continue anti-rejection drugs after the birth.
The use of previously frozen embryos created by the woman and her partner is going to be a prerequisite for a transplant. This is to avoid other fertility issues that could come up. Recipients could be cancer survivors, women born with a deformed uterus, and women who have lost their uterus due to cysts or endometriosis.
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