Could uterus transplants solve infertility for some U.S. women?

A team of doctors at the Cleveland Clinic will soon begin implanting uteruses into women who were born without them.

The research study will involve ten women who have uterine factor infertility or cannot carry a child because they were born without a uterus; the Cleveland Clinic announced Thursday, The New York Times reported.

The announcement comes almost a year after doctors in Sweden reported that a woman successfully delivered a baby boy after she received a uterus implant. The then 35-year-old woman was born without a uterus and received the implant in 2013 from a 61-year-old post-menopausal woman, according to research published in the journal The Lancet. 

The birth offered the first “proof-of-concept for uterus transplantation as a treatment for uterine factor infertility,” according to the report.  Since the first transplant, the Swedish group has implanted nine uteruses that resulted in four live births, according to a statement from the Cleveland Clinic.

UFI affects thousands of women worldwide. Some women are born without a uterus and others can acquire UFI after a hysterectomy or a serious pelvic infection, according to the clinic.

“Women who are coping with UFI have few existing options,” Tommaso Falcone, a Cleveland Clinic doctor working on the study said in statement. “Although adoption and surrogacy provide opportunities for parenthood, both pose logistical challenges and may not be acceptable due to personal, cultural or legal reasons.”

The screening process for the study began in September.

A pool of 21-to-39-year-old women with UFI faced medical and psychological evaluations from experts at the clinic before they were admitted to the study, according to the statement.

Treating UFI with uterine transplantation is still "considered highly experimental,” Falcone said in a statement. He said the study will "explore the feasibility of this approach for women in the United States.”

The successful transplants in the Swedish study offer hope that the U.S. study will also result in the delivery of "healthy infants," Andreas Tzakis, Cleveland Clinic lead investigator, said in a statement. Tzakis said the implants are unlike other organ implants in that the purpose they serve does not last a lifetime.

“They are ‘ephemeral,’” he says. “They are not intended to last for the duration of the recipient’s life, but will be maintained for only as long as is necessary to produce one or two children.”

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