Successful Pre-Treatment Ovarian Fresh Tissue Transplantation in a Cervical Cancer Patient Undergoing Radiation Therapy: A Case Report

Cervical cancer is one of the most frequent gynecological malignancies in Brazil, and most of the patients require pelvic radiotherapy as part of oncological treatment. Pelvic radiotherapy induces ovarian premature insufficiency in pre-menopausal women. This condition impacts the life quality and increases the risk of osteoporosis, obesity, cardiovascular, and neurodegenerative diseases in the middle and long term. Most of these patients have no access to hormonal replacement therapy. Techniques such as ovarian transposition have questionable results when aiming to preserve ovarian function. In this context, a promising alternative is the implantation of fresh ovarian tissue, outside the radiotherapy field, in the abdominal cavity (orthotopic implantation) or in other sites such as the forearm, breast, or subcutaneous tissue (heterotopic implantation). Here we report a successful case of autologous implantation of fresh ovarian tissue in the inner thigh of a young patient with advanced cervical cancer, who was a candidate for concurrent chemoradiotherapy.