Surgeons in India have performed a 90-second medical miracle on an unborn baby after carrying out surgery on its heart.
The doctors in New Delhi carried out the intricate surgery on the grape-sized heart on the unborn child, after its mother discovered it would be born with a defect.
The 28-year-old mother had experienced three miscarriages and was devastated to learn her unborn child may have a heart condition, India's media reports.
In a bid to prevent the foetus from being born seriously ill, doctors performed surgery on the mother's uterus, managing to successfully operate with a miniscule needle in just minutes.
Medics said a valve in the unborn infant's tiny heart had become obstructed, affecting blood circulation.
"The whole procedure had to be done very swiftly. It was very challenging. We managed to do it in around one-and-half minutes," a senior doctor told India Today.
The surgery was carried out at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in the country's capital.
"With this reshaping procedure, hopefully the foetus' heart will develop better," the doctor added.
"Both the foetus and the mother are stable and are being monitored closely."
Explaining the surgery, the doctor said: "A team of interventional cardiologists along with doctors from the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at AIIMS performed the procedure termed balloon dilation in the obstructed valve of the heart.
"Under the procedure which was performed under the guidance of ultrasound, a needle was inserted in the heart of the foetus and then, using a balloon catheter, the obstructed valve was unclogged."
The first ever surgery carried out on an unborn baby was done in the 1960s, although it wasn't until 2013 when doctors carried out the first successful heart surgery on a foetus in Philadelphia, US.
Doctors at London's Great Ormond Street Hospital and UCLH performed the first foetal surgery in the UK in 2018 when they corrected the spines of two separate babies with spina bifida.
Before this, such surgery could only be performed abroad or straight after birth.
India's country's health minister, Mansukh Mandaviya, congratulated the doctors for the impressive feat.
Writing on Twitter, Mr Mandaviya said: "I congratulate the team of doctors of @AIIMS_New Delhi for performing a successful rare procedure on grape-size heart of a foetus in 90 seconds.
"My prayers for the well-being of the baby and the mother."
