German hospital saves baby with pioneering surgery in womb

Nice story...and the baby was born healthy...BD

BERLIN (AFP) A German hospital is celebrating a world first after carrying out life-saving surgery that stimulated lung growth in a baby still in the womb. Doctors at Bonn University Clinic feared that baby Miriam would die when her mother's foetal membrane burst in the 20th week of pregnancy, removing the child's protective liquid cushion. Without the fluid, the organs pressed on the lung and Miriam's development was being fatally impaired. She was also unprotected against germs in the womb, leaving her susceptible to life-threatening infection.

There a miniature latex balloon was inflated, blocking the respiratory channel so that the fluid which is continuously produced by the prenatal lung cannot drain away. This build-up of the fluid stimulated the growth of Miriam's lung.

AFP: German hospital saves baby with pioneering surgery in womb