Donor kidney removed via vagina

[6souls]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/image...t_or-spl-1.jpg

US surgeons say they have successfully removed a healthy donor kidney through a small incision in the back of the donor's vagina.

Removing the kidney through "a natural orifice" speeds up recovery and gives a better cosmetic result - avoiding a six inch abdominal scar - they say.

The Johns Hopkins team say the 48-year-old woman who donated the organ to her niece on 29 January is "doing well".

Surgeons have also removed gallbladders and appendixes through the mouth.

Diseased gallbladders, kidneys and appendixes have been removed through the vagina before.

But this is believed to be the first time that doctors have managed to harvest a healthy donor kidney for transplantation in this way.

Dr Robert Montgomery, chief of the transplant division at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Maryland, who led the team that performed the operation, said: "Surgeons have been troubled by the need to make a relatively large incision in the patient's abdomen after completing the nephrectomy to extract the donor kidney.

"That incision is thought to significantly add to the patient's pain, hospitalisation and convalescence. Removing the kidney through a natural opening should hasten the patient's recovery and provide a better cosmetic result."

Cosmetically attractive

The operation left three pea-size scars on the Lexington Park woman's abdomen, one hidden in her navel, from where the wand-like camera and operating tools were inserted through small incisions.

Once the kidney was cut from its attachments to the abdominal wall and its arteries and veins were stapled shut, the surgeons placed the kidney in a plastic bag inserted through an incision in the vaginal wall and pulled it out through the vaginal opening with a string attached to the bag.

Dr Montgomery said the surgery took about three and a half hours, roughly the same as a traditional keyhole or laparoscopic procedure.

With keyhole surgery, an incision is typically made below the bikini line to remove the kidney.

The surgeons hope the new procedure will lead more women to become donors.

Anecdotal reports suggest living donor transplant numbers went up after keyhole procedures became available.

Dr Anthony Kalloo, the director of the Division of Gastroenterology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who pioneered the procedure, said: "Natural orifice translumenal endoscopic surgery is the final frontier to explore in making surgery scar-less, less painful and for obese patients, much safer."

In the UK, living donor kidney transplants are increasing - from 589 in 2005-2006 to 829 in 2007-2008 - and now represent more than one in three of all kidney transplants.

But the number of people on waiting lists for a transplant is also increasing - nearly 7,000 people were on the list last year and more than half of these will still be waiting for a donor, according to UK Transplant.

A spokesman for UK Transplant said: "Any development that is likely to boost donor numbers would be positive for people on waiting lists.

"Although 90% of people in the UK say that they are in favour of organ donation in principle, only 26% of the population have actually registered on the NHS Organ Donor Register. We need more people to join the register."

David Mayer, consultant transplant surgeon at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, said: "This is quite interesting in terms of having scar-less surgery and because one of the obvious problems after surgery is pain.

"There might be some discomfort but nothing like having a wound the size of a kidney on the surface of the body which might cause pain for several weeks."

BBC NEWS | Health | Donor kidney removed via vagina

[_chuchu]

Whoa. Pretty frickin cool

[melbufrauma]

im not trying to see that shit im eating ghoulash

[Silenka]

This article made my cake suddenly less appetizing. Err, it's cool, though.

[Kiro]

hueg vagina is hueg

[Tankjr]

This is a huge step in the wrong direction for gynecological fetish porn. Try avoiding a 6" scar with the specu-cam™.

[Egon]

This is a huge step in the wrong direction for gynecological fetish porn. Try avoiding a 6" scar with the specu-cam™.

See? This is why our public school system needs to go private.

[_chuchu]

They will never have my /bg/ /b/ etc.

[Tankjr]

They will never have my /bg/ /b/ etc.

Eh, you'll just wipe to it anyway.

[Egon]

Eh, you'll just wipe to it anyway.

Maybe if you'd let them wipe instead of gank on yellow.

And remember kids, its only a gank if its funny.

[Eckoku]

at first glance i thought it said diddy kong

[Elvis]

Go go gadget vagina.

[Dmitry]

So can they use a natural orifice one males? ha

[0ni0n]

Is there anything a vagina can't do?

[Kyten]

just..wow

[Patb]

Personally I am so thankful they are doing this. Being on the kidney transplant list myself, I'm happy for any kind of advance that could help more people want to donate. I've been on the list for almost 2 and a half years now, and they say it could be another 3-5 before I get a kidney ><. I don't think I can put up with dialysis for another 5 years.

[Kajii]

that's great and all but the story kind of makes me cringe

[Talus]

Yeah, that's awesome and all, but it was still done laparoscopically, it wasn't a natural orifice surgery. Usually a small flank or periumbilical incision of about 4-5 cm is made in a nephrectomy. It was dissected laparoscopically, placed in a sterile bag and extracted through the vagina.

One of the problems with this as opposed to the normal approach, is the lining of the healthy vagina, the mucosa, has a variety of flora or normal microbiota present, and there's a possibility of contamination when passing instruments or the kidney through there.

And remember that this kidney is going to an immunocompromised recipient. It seems like they just did it for the sake of doing it, increasing the complexity of the surgery for mainly cosmetic reasons (yay, no tummy scar!).

[Dimmauk]

I've heard alot more procedures will be using natural-orifice surgery. I heard someone had their stomach bypass surgery through the mouth. The thought makes my butthole cringe.

[Tankjr]

One of the problems with this as opposed to the normal approach, is the lining of the healthy vagina, the mucosa, has a variety of flora or normal microbiota present, and there's a possibility of contamination when passing instruments or the kidney through there.

Way to take something beautiful like a vagina and make it sound dirty.