Two-year-old receives life-saving windpipe created from her own stem cells

In another success story for life-affirming stem cell research, the life of a two-year-old girl has been saved as doctors were able to use her own stem cells to create a windpipe for a little girl who was born without one. 

(Photo: Kim Myung-sub, AP/The Korea Herald)

Hannah Warren has been unable to breathe, eat, drink or swallow on her own since she was born in South Korea in 2010. Until the operation at a U.S. hospital, she had spent her entire life in a hospital in Seoul. Doctors there told her parents there was no hope and they expected her to die.

The stem cells came from Hannah's bone marrow, extracted with a special needle inserted into her hip bone. They were seeded in a lab onto a plastic scaffold, where it took less than a week for them to multiply and create a new windpipe.

The windpipe was implanted April 9 in a nine-hour procedure.

Early signs indicate the windpipe is working, Hannah's doctors announced Tuesday, although she is still on a ventilator. They believe she will eventually be able to live at home and lead a normal life.

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