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Sunday, April 13th, 2014

Engineered Vaginas Grown in Women for the First Time

Author:     CATHERINE DE LANGE
Source:     New Scientist (U.K.)
Publication Date:     4/10/2014 23:30
 Link: Engineered Vaginas Grown in Women for the First Time
Stephan:   I consider this major good news. For almost a decade SR has been tracking the Organ Growth Trend as one of the next big leaps in medicine. It will kill the organ black market, and end the need for rejection medication just for starters. I must say though it had never occurred to me that this trend would take off with vaginas. SOURCE: The Lancet, DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(14)60542-0 and 10.1016/S01460544-4 Click through to see a very helpful video.

Vaginas grown in a lab from the recipients’ own cells have been successfully transferred to the body for the first time.

The surgery was carried out on four women who were born without vaginal canals because of a rare condition. The women, who were teenagers at the time of the operation, now have fully functioning sexual organs.

“After the operation they were able to function normally. They had normal levels of desire, arousal, satisfaction and orgasm,” says Anthony Atala at Wake Forest School of Medicine in North Carolina, who led the research. He published the results only after four to eight years had elapsed following surgery, enough time for him to be sure there were no long-term complications.

The four women had undeveloped vaginas because they all have a severe form of a condition called Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser Syndrome (MKRH), which affects about 1 in 5000 women. They also had some abnormal development of the uterus, although they did have a vulva – the external part of the sex organ which includes the labia and the clitoris. They were not able to have penetrative sex or menstruate. One of the women was diagnosed after her menstrual blood had collected in her abdomen.

As well as having […]

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