Unborn baby has pioneering surgery inside womb
The third baby in the trial was carried to term after surgeons pushed his intestines back before birth, doctors said.
- London infant Theo became the first baby from the UK to undergo pioneering prenatal surgery at Texas Children's Hospital, correcting gastroschisis, a rare birth defect where intestines develop externally.
- Gastroschisis affects one in 3,000 babies annually, typically detected during 20-week scans. Specialists at Great Ormond Street Hospital referred mother Maisie Savage to Texas after diagnosing the complex condition at 24 weeks.
- Surgeons led by Dr. Michael Belfort performed the operation while Savage was 26 weeks pregnant, using keyhole surgery to gently push the intestines back inside the abdomen before stitching the womb closed.
- Theo was born in February following the successful procedure. Now five months old and thriving, Savage described her son as a "little miracle," and the family feels incredibly fortunate.
- Professor Paolo De Coppi of GOSH expressed optimism that if the clinical trial proves successful, this procedure could become standard treatment offered in the UK, marking a significant advancement in foetal medicine.
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Theo, the third baby, was operated on while he was still in the womb, in order to remove the defect.
Unborn baby has pioneering surgery inside the womb. Now his doctor is waiting to see if it was a success
For some babies diagnosed with gastroschisis in the womb, treatment can mean surgery followed by months of medical appointments afterward. In more complex cases, the birth defect — in which a baby's intestines develop outside the body — can be fatal. For U.K. mother Maisie Savage, 29, and her unborn baby boy, Theo, however, neither was the case.
Groundbreaking Womb Surgery Corrects Rare Birth Defect
What if doctors could fix a life-threatening birth defect before a baby was even born? For five-month-old Theo, that remarkable possibility became reality through a pioneering operation that could transform fetal medicine.Theo was diagnosed during pregnancy with complex gastroschisis, a rare condition. The abdominal wall fails to develop properly, leaving the intestines outside the body.Theo became the first British baby to be operated on in the…
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