Four women have had new vaginas grown in the laboratory and implanted by doctors in the US.<\/p>\n
A tissue sample and a biodegradable scaffold were used to grow vaginas in the right size and shape for each woman as well as being a tissue match.<\/p>\n
They all reported normal levels of “desire, arousal, lubrication, orgasm, satisfaction” and painless intercourse.<\/p>\n
Experts said the study, published in the Lancet, was the latest example of the power of regenerative medicine.<\/p>\n
‘I feel fortunate’<\/strong><\/p>\n In each woman the vagina did not form properly while they were still inside their mother’s womb, a condition known as vaginal aplasia.<\/p>\n Current treatments can involve surgically creating a cavity, which is then lined with skin grafts or parts of the intestine.<\/p>\n Doctors at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Centre in North Carolina used pioneering technology to build vaginas for the four women who were all in their teenage years at the time.<\/p>\n Scans of the pelvic region were used to design a tube-like 3D-scaffold for each patient.<\/p>\n A small tissue biopsy was taken from the poorly developed vulva and grown to create a large batch of cells in the laboratory.<\/p>\n Muscle cells were attached to the outside of the scaffold and vaginal-lining cells to the inside.<\/p>\n The vaginas were carefully grown in a bioreactor until they were suitable to be surgically implanted into the patients.<\/p>\n One of the women with an implanted vagina, who wished to keep her name anonymous, said: “I believe in the beginning when you find out you feel different.<\/p>\n “I mean while you are living the process, you are seeing the possibilities you have and all the changes you’ll go through.<\/p>\n “Truly I feel very fortunate because I have a normal life, completely normal.”<\/p>\n ‘An important thing’<\/strong><\/p>\n All the women reported normal sexual function.<\/p>\n Vaginal aplasia can lead to other abnormalities in the reproductive organs, but in two of the women the vagina was connected to the uterus.<\/p>\n There have been no pregnancies, but for those women it is theoretically possible.<\/p>\n Dr Anthony Atala, director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine at Wake Forest, told the BBC News website: “Really for the first time we’ve created a whole organ that was never there to start with, it was a challenge.”<\/p>\n He said a functioning vagina was a “very important thing” for these women’s lives and witnessing the difference it made to them “was very rewarding to see”.<\/p>\n This is the first time the results have been reported. However, the first implants took place eight years ago.<\/p>\n ‘Most important questions’<\/strong><\/p>\n Meanwhile, researchers at the University of Basel in Switzerland have used similar techniques to reconstruct the noses of patients after skin cancer.<\/p>\n It could replace the need to take cartilage from the ribs or ears in order to rebuild the damage caused by cutting the cancer away.<\/p>\n Prof Martin Birchall, who has worked on lab-grown windpipes, commented: “These authors have not only successfully treated several patients with a difficult clinical problem, but addressed some of the most important questions facing translation of tissue engineering technologies.<\/p>\n The steps between first-in-human experiences such as those reported here and their use in routine clinical care remain many, including larger trials with long-term follow-up, the development of clinical grade processing, scale-out, and commercialisation.”<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Four women have had new vaginas grown in the laboratory and implanted by doctors in the US. A tissue sample and a biodegradable scaffold were used to grow vaginas in the right size and shape for each woman as well as being a tissue match. 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