Mother/daughter womb transplants a first

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GOTHENBURG, Sweden, Sept. 18 (UPI) -- One woman who had her uterus removed due to cancer and another born without one each got a transplanted uterus from her mother, Swedish researchers say.

Team leader Mats Brannstrom, professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, told The Local in a statement, both mothers were doing well and were walking around since the surgeries last weekend, and were expected to be discharged soon. Their daughters were tired, but doing well, he said.

Brannstrom said the team had trained for 14 years to do the "complicated" surgery, first working on mice and then larger animals before moving on to diseased human donors. It also involved 40 scientific works on the subject.

The purpose of the research is to allow women who had their uterus remove due to cervical cancer or who were born without one to receive a new womb via transplantation, the researchers said.

These are the first successful mother-daughter transplants in the world, Brannstrom said. A uterus transplant between two unrelated women occurred in Saudi Arabia in 2002.