The sealed bag, made of polythene, contains amniotic fluid to provide all the nutrients and protection needed for growth, an interface delivering oxygen just as an umbilical cord would, and exchanging gases just like a placenta.
The system works to mimic the environment of a natural womb and the team hopes to one day adapt the technology for use on premature babies.
"We've developed a system that, as closely as possible, reproduces the environment of the womb and replaces the function of the placenta," said Dr. Alan Flake, a fetal surgeon and director of the Center for Fetal Research in the Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) who led the research, published Tuesday.
"This, in theory, should allow support of premature infants," he said, adding that his team's goal is to "meet the unmet need of extreme prematurity."
One in ten US births are premature (younger than 37 weeks gestational age), according to the team. And about 30,000 per year are critically preterm, meaning they are born younger than 26 weeks. The average human gestation period is 40 weeks.
Flake adds this level of extreme prematurity is the leading cause of infant mortality and morbidity in the US, accounting for one-third of all infant deaths and one-half of all cases of cerebral palsy attributed to prematurity.
The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in the UK also report poor survival of babies born at gestations below 24 weeks, despite great progress in neonatal care.
Globally, more than one in 10 pregnancies will end in preterm birth. In babies born preterm, the chance of survival at less than 23 weeks is almost zero, while at 23 weeks it is 15%, at 24 weeks 55% and at 25 weeks this increases to about 80%, according to UK maternal and fetal research charity, Tommy's.
Flake's team hope their new system may improve survival rates among this group of babies in the future, but acknowledge it will take at least a decade. (ontinueReading
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