BBC News Indonesia
·Aug 2026
The story of a fetus operated on while still in its mother's womb
Doctors performed pioneering fetal surgery on Theo, a British baby with complex gastroschisis, at 26 weeks of pregnancy in Texas. Surgeons partially opened Maisie Savage’s uterus, used keyhole surgery to return the fetus’s intestines to his abdomen, and then allowed the pregnancy to continue for another 14 weeks. Theo was born normally in Texas and is now healthy at five months. The successful procedure was part of the first clinical trial for complex gastroschisis and involved specialists from Texas Children’s Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital and University College London, who hope to expand access to the treatment in the UK and explore further in-utero procedures.