Zurich University Children's Hospital pioneers prenatal surgery

Zurich University Children's Hospital pioneers prenatal surgery - swissinfo: Doctors at Zurich University Children’s Hospital have carried out surgery on foetuses still inside their mothers’ wombs. The operations - the first of their kind outside the United States - were conducted on unborn children with spina bifida, a defect in which the backbone and spinal canal do not close before birth.

Experts say a particular challenge of this kind of surgery is the fact that two distinct patients, the mother and the foetus, have to be anaesthetised, monitored and operated on simultaneously. These kinds of operations to correct spina bifida are more successful when conducted before the birth, according to a US study.

Editor: Meanwhile, the Swiss allow assisted suicide at the Dignitas clinic.