Adoption of minimally invasive surgery after neoadjuvant chemotherapy in women with metastatic uterine cancer

Uterine allograft removal by total laparoscopic hysterectomy after successful cesarean delivery in a living-donor uterus recipient with uterovaginal agenesis (MRKHS)

PURPOSE

To limit the burden of long-term immunosuppression (IS) after uterus transplantation (UTx), removal of the uterine allograft is indicated after maximum two pregnancies. Hitherto this has required graft hysterectomy by laparotomy. Our objective was to demonstrate, as a proof of concept, the feasibility of less traumatic transplantectomy by total laparoscopic hysterectomy (TLH).

PATIENT

A 37-year-old woman with uterovaginal agenesis due to Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome (MRKHS) who had undergone neovaginoplasty at age 19 years prior to living-donor (LD) UTx in 10/2019 at age 35 years gave birth to a healthy boy by primary cesarean section in 06/2021. During pregnancy, she developed impaired renal function, with bilateral hydronephrosis, necessitating early allograft removal in 09/2021 to prevent chronic kidney disease, particularly during a potential second pregnancy.

METHODS

Transplantectomy by TLH essentially followed standard TLH procedures. We paid meticulous attention to removing as much donor tissue as possible to prevent postoperative complications from residual donor tissue after stopping IS, as well as long-term vascular damage.

RESULTS

TLH was performed successfully without the need to convert to open surgery. Surgical time was 90 min with minimal blood loss. No major complications occurred intra- or postoperatively and during the subsequent 9-month follow-up period. Kidney function normalized.

CONCLUSIONS

To our knowledge, we report the first successful TLH-based removal of a uterine allograft in a primipara after LD UTx, thus demonstrating the feasibility of TLH in uterus recipients with MRKHS.