India had its first baby born following a uterine transplant at Pune’s Galaxy Hospital.
About:
For women whose uterus is not healthy, or who do not have one, a transplant is the newest form of infertility treatment. In India, about 17% of all women face issues relating to infertility, and the reason is related to the uterus in 20% of such cases.
The transplanted uterus is generally intended to be removed after the woman has gone through one or two childbirths.
Normal reproduction is not possible with a transplanted uterus. Therefore, a transplant makes sense only because of the success of the technology of in vitro fertilisation (outside the body).
The childbirth happens through surgical intervention; the woman experiences no labour pain.
In the earliest cases, doctors took almost 13 hours to retrieve the uterus, because they performed open surgery. With laparoscopic intervention, the time has now come down to about six hours.
Global scenario:
The first successful uterine transplant was performed in Saudi Arabia in 2002 but did not result in pregnancy.
Since then, there have been 27 such transplants, with only 11 women going on to have successful deliveries. Nine of the other 11 babies were born in Sweden, and two in the US.
The first birth after a transplant, in 2014, happened in Sweden.
Recent incidence:
Meenakshi Valand, the woman who delivered the child, had a scarred uterus (Asherman’s syndrome) due to multiple abortions and cases of stillbirths. It was unable to hold another foetus.
Her mother donated the uterus. In May 2017, Meenakshi Valand underwent the country’s first uterine transplants.
In April 2018, an embryo was transferred into Meenakshi’s womb and resulted in a pregnancy.
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