Artificial Urinary Bladder

On April 4 2006 a team of biologists at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine announced that they had created the world's first lab-grown organ and transplantet it into a human being. This organ was a bladder and a total of seven humans received transplants by this technic. Because the bladders were grown from tissue belonging to respective patients own bladder there were no risk of transplant rejection.

Development of the Artificial Urnary Bladder

Dogs were the first to test this new technique, already in 1999 lab-grown bladers were successfully transplanted into dogs. These bladders worked properly for about one years time.

Artificial Bladder Procedure

The technique used in 2006 is called orthotopic neobladder procedure. The procedure involves shaping a part, usually about 35 inches, of a patient's small intestine to form a new bladder. First a CT scan is taken to determine the shape of the bladder to create. Then a tissue sample is taken from the patient's bladder and the cells are grown about 4 weeks and then shaped into a bladder a biodegradable scaffold. Finally the new bladder along with the biodegradable scaffold is transplanted. The biodegradable scaffold is safely degraded within the patient's body.