American surgeons have succeeded in performing a human bladder transplant, in a surgery that is the first of its kind in the world and could constitute a turning point for patients suffering from serious bladder disorders.
The patient who underwent this surgery is named Oscar Larrenzar, a 41-year-old father who has been undergoing dialysis for seven years.
This surgery was carried out in cooperation between two universities in California.
One of these two universities, UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles), said in a statement that the patient developed cancer, which required the removal of a large part of his bladder years ago, and then his kidneys were removed.
The statement explained that Larrenzar received a bladder and a kidney - from the same donor - during the surgery, which lasted approximately eight hours and was conducted at the beginning of this May at the Ronald Reagan University Medical Center in California.
The university noted in its statement that “surgeons first transplanted the kidney, then the bladder, then connected the kidney to the new bladder using the technique they developed.”
The statement quoted one of the surgeons, Dr. Nima Nasiri, as saying that the results of the operation were encouraging and almost immediate.
"The kidney immediately produced a large amount of urine and the patient's kidney function improved immediately," he said.
He added, "There was no need for dialysis after the operation, and urine flowed properly into the new bladder."
In turn, Inderbir Gill, who co-led the operation, said: “This surgery represents a historic moment in medicine and could lead to a shift in the treatment of patients with bladder failure.”
Bladder transplants were previously considered very complicated, especially due to the difficulty of accessing the area and connecting it to blood vessels.
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