Two years can be implanted in the womb

British doctors have made new strides in womb transplantation, giving hope to thousands of women who cannot have children for medical reasons.

Photo: David Rose

London anatomists and veterinarians are working with two medical groups from New York and Budapest who have performed a first case of rabbits for rabbits. If testing on larger animals is successful, then in the next 2 years, it will be conducted for the first woman to have a baby from a second woman who has just died, the researchers declared as so.

In the UK alone, there are about 15,000 women of childbearing age since birth without having a womb or having a gastrectomy after getting sick or cancer. If implants are found in the womb, they will not have to raise or adopt a pregnant woman.

Richard Smith, a gynecologic surgeon at Hammersmith Hospital, West London, said his team solved the key problem of maintaining regular blood supply to the uterus when transplanted from this rabbit. to another child, allowing the uterus to remain 'alive' long enough to become pregnant. But this project has been stopped due to skepticism from the medical community and lack of funds to continue. However, a charity called Uterine Transplant UK sponsored £ 250,000 to continue the experiment.

In fact, the trial of uterine transplantation was done on a 26-year-old woman since 2000 but failed because after 90 days of maintenance, the blood supply to the uterus was created a blockage. Continuous blood supply is considered an important issue. Therefore, only after maintaining regular blood supply in successful experiments with pigs, sheep, goats and monkeys is allowed to test on humans.

Gynecological implants for rabbits. Photo: Times

The most recent experiment, which the results reported at the American Society for Reproductive Medicine in Atlanta, is conducted with five pairs of rabbits given - received at the Royal London Veterinary School. Of the five rabbits grafted to the uterus, two had lived for 10 months, and after they died, the scientists concluded that it was unrelated to the transplant, indicating that the graft was successful.

When these two rabbits are still alive, they are allowed to "take the male" for a natural pregnancy, but they cannot. They must be pregnant with in vitro fertilized embryos.

Later, if a human experiment is successful, women who have a gynecological transplant will also fertilize outside the test tube and have to undergo surgery to avoid unforeseen risks. In addition, to prevent them from taking anti-rejection drugs for life, after having had their own children, they must remove the implant after a while.

The surgeons in New York were allowed to experiment on humans after proving that the uterus' begging from the donor could be preserved for 12 hours, enough to complete an operation. implant.

Tony Rutherford, chairman of the British Society for Reproductive Medicine still believes that "there is a big difference between being able to prove it on a rabbit with a greater ability to succeed in humans," he said.