Israeli Doctors Perform Extraordinarily Rare Surgery to Remove ‘Totally Huge’ Tumor From Pregnant Woman and Save Her Baby

Israeli doctors successfully performed an extraordinarily rare surgery on a pregnant woman to remove what the chief surgeon described as a “totally huge” growth from her uterus, resulting in the birth of a healthy, full-term boy five months later.

Dr. Oz Gavish, senior physician at Rabin Medical Center’s Helen Schneider Hospital for Women outside Tel Aviv who operated on the woman, told TheBlaze that when the 32-year-old patient, Danielle Skald, first came to him at the end of her first trimester, she had a mass in her uterus that was about 6 inches in diameter.

The doctors believed it was most likely a fibroid known as a subserous myoma, “but totally huge,” Gavish, who specializes in high-risk pregnancy, said in a phone call from his office Thursday.

“She looked like she was in the middle of pregnancy at three months,” Gavish said.

Photo credit: Shutterstock/Oldrich

Because it was just the beginning of her pregnancy, Gavish said he was worried that as the fibroid continued to grow it would push against her liver, intestines or diaphragm and cause excruciating pain.

“I told her she might have pain or it would get in way of the pregnancy, and we may have to decide what to do about the pregnancy,” Gavish recalled.

At the time, they discussed three options: terminating the pregnancy and removing the fibroid from her uterus; taking a “wait and see” approach and not intervening; or operating during the pregnancy.

“The problem was the third choice is very rare, not at all common. It’s not a routine operation at all,” Gavish said. “We do operations during pregnancy – when it is urgent and has to do with other organs. It’s very, very rare to operate on the uterus because the fetus is living there and you don’t know what it’s going to do to it.”

He said that performing surgery on the uterus during pregnancy not only carries the risk of miscarriage, but also threatens the life of the mother.

“Because the uterus is so vascular in pregnancy, the operation could cause bleeding and threaten the life of the woman,” he said.

Gavish presented her case to his colleagues, and most voted for the second option – not to intervene at all. But reality kicked in just weeks later when Skald showed up at the hospital doubled over in pain.

“At 16 weeks, she came to me with unbearable pain,” Gavish recalled.

"I couldn't get out of bed because of the pain. I barely reached the car," Danielle Skald told the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Aharonot.

They did another ultrasound exam and found that the fibroid was pushing against her liver and kidneys.

Given the new symptoms and the size of the fibroid, “it was easier to make the case that while the operation isn’t a picnic or easy during pregnancy, but as a last resort, we need to take the difficult decision.”

Gavish was particularly worried that the fibroid would grow even more as the pregnancy progressed.

“It was very clear to me. I pushed that there be an operation,” he said, even though such a surgery was risky.

The surgeon said that medical literature cites fewer than five cases like this one over decades.

Skald said that she and her husband agreed to go ahead with the surgery, “despite the fact that it was clear this was a risk to me and to the child."

Because this kind of surgery was such a rare event, the “operating theater” was just that, with other doctors present to watch Gavish and his colleagues perform the medical procedure.

The doctors had no choice but to perform a laparotomy, or opening the abdomen. Gavish said there was no option of a minimally invasive surgery because the fibroid was so big.

“It was a dramatic decision,” Gavish recalled. “The surgery in our luck and joy went very smoothly.”

“I was so happy it all went well,” Gavish said, but after the surgery a new dilemma arose: what mode of delivery for the baby?

“We know a scarred uterus is prone to rupture,” so most doctors would vote for a Caesarean section, he said. The patient also asked for a C-section because of the potential risk — but those plans were scuttled last week when she went into labor two days before the scheduled Caesarean at 40 weeks gestation, and she had a vaginal birth instead.

Skald and her husband, Eli, are now the proud parents of a baby boy.