A team of surgeons at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) successfully completed the world's first human bladder transplant.
The surgery was performed on the 4th of this month at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, marking a hopeful medical advancement for other patients suffering from severe bladder diseases.
In a statement on the 18th, UCLA announced that the recipient of this innovative surgery was 41-year-old Larry Reinzal. He is a father of four and had most of his bladder removed due to cancer a few years ago.
Reinzal later had both kidneys removed due to cancer and end-stage kidney disease and underwent seven years of dialysis treatment.
He received a bladder and a kidney from an organ donor, and they were successfully transplanted during an eight-hour surgery.
In the statement, UCLA said: “Doctors first transplanted the kidney and then the bladder, using newly developed techniques to connect the kidney to the new bladder.”
Nassiri, the surgeon involved in the transplant, stated that the results of the surgery were almost immediate.
He said: “The kidney immediately produced a large amount of urine, and the patient's kidney function improved drastically. No dialysis was needed after the surgery, and urine could flow normally into the new bladder.”
Nassiri and his colleague, Surgeon Jill, noted that due to the complex structure of pelvic blood vessels, a complete bladder transplant had never been done before, making the surgery technically challenging.
Nassiri said: “The first attempt at a bladder transplant has been in progress for over four years.”
Previously, patients needing bladder reconstruction could use a portion of the intestine to create an artificial bladder or use a pouch to collect urine. However, these techniques present some short-term and long-term risks that doctors hope to avoid through full bladder transplants.