Science / Medicine : Surgery Saves Life of Fetus

In the latest of a series of daring operations, UC San Francisco surgeons saved the life of one of two fetuses with a deformed lung by performing surgery in the womb, it was reported last week in the British medical journal The Lancet.

Although doctors have performed successful operations on fetuses for other ailments, the new cases are the first in which surgery was done for a condition called congenital cystic adenomatoid malformation, or CCAM, the researchers said.

CCAM is a rare disorder in which damaging cysts grow in the lungs of developing fetuses.

The 72-minute procedure involved making an incision in the mother’s uterus and pulling the left arm and chest of the fetus through the opening. Surgeons then cut open the chest of the fetus, surgically removed the malformed lung lobe, put the fetus back in the womb and closed the incision.

The baby was delivered through Caesarean section seven weeks later and was doing well five months later, the doctors reported.