“She is very happy”: a young woman with cancer was the protagonist of the first uterine transposition surgery in Uruguay to avoid losing fertility

The creator of this technique traveled to prepare the team and participate in the interventions.

For the first time in Uruguay, uterine transposition surgery was performed. The Brazilian doctor Reitan Ribeiro, creator of the technique, participated in the intervention together with surgeons from the Pereira Rossell Hospital.

The patient is a 26-year-old girl treated for cancer that required radiotherapy. This was going to generate alterations that, later on, would prevent her from getting pregnant. That is why she underwent this unprecedented procedure, in two stages. The first was in January, at the multipurpose surgical center of the National Institute of Orthopedics and Traumatology (INOT).

“In this first stage, the uterine transposition was performed out of the pelvis into the abdomen, out of the radiation fields and in this second stage, once her oncological treatment was finished, Dr. Ribeiro again came with us to do the uterine relocation to level of the pelvis and the restructuring of the entire female genital apparatus”, explained Dr. Joel Laufer, a member of the UdelaR Gynecology Clinic.

The creator of this technique traveled to prepare the team and participate in the interventions. He started doing it in the state of Paraná and some 20 centers around the world already apply it, with good results.

“We are beginning an investigation, but little by little there are patients who become pregnant spontaneously without needing fertilization or anything and are having normal evolution of the pregnancy, with healthy children. The results are very interesting,” predicted the oncological surgeon Ribeiro.

What did the intervention consist of?

The first operation consisted of removing the ovaries and the uterus from the pelvis, and transferring them to the upper hemi-abdomen, at the level of the stomach. In this way, the patient underwent radiotherapy without affecting her fertility. In this second stage, everything returned to its place.

“Having had the opportunity to perform this surgery for this patient, who wanted to keep her fertile life, has undoubtedly been a joy. Today she is very happy and recovering from anesthesia at this time,” said the director of the Hospital de la Woman, Risel Suarez.

This type of surgery requires infrastructure, technology, but also qualified and trained professionals. That is why the creator of the technique traveled, and will do so again when this intervention is carried out again at the Pereira Rossell.

For this, he had the support of the Peluffo Giguens Foundation. Also to help the patient, who is from the interior and stayed at the La Campana home.

“At this moment, at the same time, we are doing very important work for the Women’s Hospital so that oncological treatments are more and more comfortable, as best as possible,” stressed, for his part, the president of the Peluffo Giguens Foundation, Alejandro Barrere.

“The human material is there and our function is also to give them a hand with all the infrastructure. This type of thing is very important,” he said.

In turn, he stressed the importance of continuing to support doctors from abroad “to come and teach” so that Uruguayan doctors can perform these procedures “easier.”