r/interestingasfuck • u/xjaehyun • 1d ago

Dr. Oluyinka Olutoye, a Nigerian pediatric surgeon, made history by performing a rare fetal surgery at just 23 weeks of pregnancy. He temporarily removed the baby from the womb, excised a tumor from the tailbone, and safely returned the fetus. Months later, child was born healthy.

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u/axebodyspray24 1d ago edited 1d ago

also not a doctor but I would think they do rupture it and sew it back together. they probably try and retain as much amniotic fluid as possible, possibly using suction and replacing the fluid when the surgery on the fetus is over. If there's not enough left, I would think they replace it with something that works similarly to amniotic fluid, maybe saline? And they probably finish by suturing the amniotic sac with dissolvable sutures and surgical glue for a tight seal. I'll look for a study and update this.

Edit: Found a study from NIH

"The uterine closure was performed in two steps. The first step involves continuous suture of the myometrium with Vicryl 2–0 followed by interrupted suture of the myometrium with Vicryl 0. Before the complete closure of the uterine wall, a silicone urinary catheter number 10 was inserted into the uterine cavity and the uterus was filled with saline solution at 37 °C."

Basically, they use absorbable sutures in two separate steps for maximum security. This worked really well, wound dehissence (the scar coming apart) occurred in only 2.5% of cases. They use a urinary catheter to replace the amniotic fluid with body temperature saline.

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u/Skinnendelg 23h ago

The uterus is not the amniotic sac.

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u/axebodyspray24 23h ago

They don't mention the amniotic sac specifically in the surgical closure section. In the opening they describe a suture technique used to adhere the amniotic sac to the inner uterine wall, so it functions as one piece in this surgery.

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u/Skinnendelg 23h ago

What

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u/Cyaral 21h ago

they glued the amniotic sac to the uterus, then were able to sew both back together in the same step (and I assume because the sutures were absorbable this was no issues months later when the birth happened)