Turkish Woman Loses Baby After Successful Womb Transplant

A hospital in Turkey says that a Turkish woman who was the first to get pregnant with a transplanted donor womb had her baby terminated after the embryo showed no heartbeat, Fox News reported.

Derya Sert was born without a womb and in August 2011 received a transplant. She has been receiving in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment since, and announced her first pregnancy in April, fulfilling her dream of motherhood. Doctors placed an embryo into her donated womb using one of her own eggs.

According to the New York Daily News, hospital spokesperson Fusun Bas said in April that early test results were "consistent with the expected signs of pregnancy," but cautioned that it was too early to confirm the pregnancy. Nonetheless, Sert became pregnant with the world's first successful womb transplant from a dead donor. 

Professor Ozkan, who performed the pioneering transplant on Sert in August 2012, announced her IVF treatment at a conference attended by the world's top transplant specialists in December 2012, according to the Daily Mail.

"This is the longest time any woman has gone without rejecting an implanted womb and we wanted to reach the year-and-a-half mark before going ahead," he said at the time. "That will hopefully happen in three months' time as things are looking good so far."

He also described Sert's health as as completely normal.

"It's not only important for us to have this contact for the patient, it's also important for future cases," he said.

"If I had a magic wand, I would want to be pregnant now," Sert, who is 35 and married, told reporters. "I just want to hold my baby in my arms, to be a mother."

She wouldn't get her wish. 

"Derya Sert's pregnancy was terminated after her end-of-8-weeks examination showed no embryo heartbeat," said Akdeniz University Hospital in Turkey's Mediterranean city of Antalya in a statement.

The hospital also said that "the general health status of the patient is fine."

"IVF will be continued when she is ready, in appropriate conditions," the statement further said, adding that Sert would receive new fertilization treatment to try and get pregnant again.

Sert is one of 5,000 women globally who are born without a womb. Thousands more women have the organ removed due to cancer or other diseases, leaving them unable to become pregnant.

If Sert is able to give birth with the first successful womb transplant, it would provide hope for women around the world who were born without a womb or who have lost it to disease.