Chris Boucher donated his kidney to his toddler daughter Lucy in a ground-breaking operation that was made possible using 3D printing technology.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and answer the questions.
1 When did Lucy have a transplant?
2 Was open chest surgery needed this time?
3 How often had a 3D printed model been used in an operation like this?
4 Who recovered from the operation more quickly, Lucy or her dad?
5 When will technology allow to grow an organ using 3D bio-printing?
6 What will Lucy be doing next year?
This is the first week since she was a month old that Lucy Boucher will only need to go to hospital once. Since suffering heart and kidney failure she's been kept alive by dialysis until she was big enough to have a transplant two months ago.
What did daddy give you?
A kidney in my tummy
And how do you feel?
Better.
Transplanting a fully grown adult's kidney into a toddler is tricky. Often open chest surgery is needed just to find out if the organ will fit. But not this time. Surgeons at Great Ormond Street Hospital were able to precisely plan the procedure using a 3D printed model of Lucy's insides and her dad's kidney.
This is a 3D print of Lucy's father’s kidneys, the right kidney that we printed, and as you can see quite clearly, this is the problem that we are facing sometimes is to fit an adult size kidney into a smaller child. In this case, we had to essentially move the liver up slightly like that, so it was fitting in like that.
It's the first time in the world this technology has been used to help a kidney transplant.
It's quite a thing to get round that you know, part of Chris is now in Lucy and obviously doing very, very well, but yeah, it was fascinating to see and to hold them and to see how both were going to fit together.
Both father and daughter are now recovering well and Lucy has been a model patient.
I was really wiped out for the first couple of weeks whereas, within a week or so Lucy was bounding around everywhere, you know, literally bouncing on the bed, you know, running around.
Doctors say this is just the start for pioneering printing in medicine.
The next step is to try and actually grow an organ using 3D bio-printing and there are various laboratories on the world trying to explore that possibility. So that really is the next big step. We're probably a few years away from that.
Lucy has more immediate plans- starting nursery next year and looking forward to a new healthy chapter of her life.
1 Two months ago
2 No
3 Never before
4 Lucy
5 In a few years' time
6 She will be starting nursery.
