Back protection

At University Hospital Zurich, fetuses with an “open spine” can be operated on while still in the womb. Nicole Ochsenbein-Kölble at the Department of Obstetrics intends to make the surgery even better – so that even more of the children affected can grow up healthy.

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Sara Schweiger* had gone for the ultrasound without a care in the world. But in the 20th week in her pregnancy they discovered that her child had an “open spine.” In this defect, known as spina bifida, a section of the unborn child’s spine is not completely enclosed. This means the bone marrow is damaged during pregnancy.

In Switzerland alone, around 30 children a year are born with spina bifida. Often they suffer their whole life long from paralysis, incontinence or the consequences of brain damage. In 2010, University Hospital Zurich (USZ) became one of the first hospitals in the world to offer special treatment for spina bifida. It involves surgery on the fetus in the womb before birth: opening up the womb and closing the open section of the fetus’s back. This prevents further damage to the nerve bundles.

Sara Schweiger also opted for an operation at USZ. The team around Professor Nicole Ochsenbein-Kölble at the USZ Department of Obstetrics has already done more than 180 surgeries of this sort. Around a third of the children who have this surgery subsequently live with no impairments at all. Another third enjoy a significantly better quality of life.

The Department of Obstetrics now intends to improve this success rate even further. With the support of a donation to the USZ Foundation, Nicole Ochsenbein-Kölble and her team are currently conducting a project to test the hypothesis that the circulation of blood in a specific artery in the fetus’s brain can indicate already during the operation whether the surgery has been performed in the best way possible. If this is the case, even more children with spina bifida could optimally benefit from surgery in the womb – and, like Lea*, could get a good start to life. Sara Schweiger’s daughter is a very lively little girl. Thanks to the operation, she hasn’t suffered any impairment.

*Anonymized/symbolic image

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