Baby born from ovary frozen in mother's childhood

Researcher removes tissue from liquid nitrogen — The woman was implanted with her childhood tissue

A woman has become the first in the world to give birth to a baby using transplanted ovarian tissue frozen when she herself was still a child.

The 27-year-old had an ovary removed at age 13 just before she began invasive treatment for sickle cell anaemia.

Her remaining ovary failed following the treatment, meaning she would have been unlikely to conceive without the transplant.

Experts say this procedure could now help other young medical patients.

Bone marrow transplant

The woman, who has asked to remain anonymous, was diagnosed with sickle cell anaemia at the age of five.

She emigrated from the Republic of Congo to Belgium where doctors decided her disease was so severe that she needed a bone marrow transplant using her brother's matching tissue.

But before they could begin the bone marrow transplant, they needed to give her chemotherapy to disable her immune system and stop it from rejecting the foreign tissue.

Chemotherapy can destroy the ovarian function, so they removed her right ovary and froze tissue fragments. At that time, she was showing signs of puberty, but had not yet started her periods. Her remaining ovary failed at 15.

Ten years later, she decided she wanted to have a baby, so doctors grafted four of her thawed ovarian fragments onto her remaining ovary and 11 fragments onto other sites in her body.

Baby boy

The patient started menstruating spontaneously five months later, and became pregnant naturally at the age of 27, giving birth to a healthy boy in November 2014.

The details of the case were published on Wednesday in the journal Human Reproduction.

The gynaecologist who led the treatment to restore the patient's fertility, Dr Isabelle Demeestere, said it was now hoped the procedure could help other young people at risk of ovarian failure, especially given there is an increasing number of long-term survivors of haematological diseases diagnosed in childhood.

"However, the success of this procedure requires further investigation in very young pre-pubertal girls, as our patient had already started puberty even though she had not started menstruating," she explained.

She also warned that it would only be suitable for patients at high risk of ovarian failure, due to risks such as damaging the removed healthy ovary or reintroducing malignant cells at the time of transplant.

Adam Balen, chairman of the British Fertility Society, welcomed the news.

"There had previously been uncertainty as to whether ovarian tissue taken from young girls would later on be competent to produce mature, fertile eggs, so today's case is both reassuring and exciting," he said.

Around 40 babies have already been born around the world using frozen ovarian tissue taken from older women.