Yesterday, we brought you news of a story in Belgium involving questions about whether a woman who gave birth following an ovarian transplant could have become pregnant without the transplant. The case, which led to a university investigation but no retraction, included allegations of theft and arson.
This morning, we were made aware of a request for a retraction from The Lancet related to other work by Jacques Donnez, the obstetrician-gynecologist at the center of the case. In 2004, Donnez and colleagues published what they said was the first pregnancy using frozen banked ovarian tissue in The Lancet. The paper has been cited hundreds of times, but not everyone agreed with Donnez et al’s assessment at the time. All but one of the authors of a Lancet letter — colleagues of Donnez’s at the Catholic University of Louvain — describing the perinatal follow-up of the woman now say they don’t either, and want to retract their letter.
In their letter requesting retraction, published in the journal on July 14, Corinne Hubinont and colleagues write that they “did not have access to the patient’s gynaecological records throughout the pregnancy,” but that “Recently, we had the opportunity to read the patient’s notes,” which include a progesterone measurement “omitted by Donnez and colleagues:” Continue reading Ovarian transplant update: Authors of 2004 live-birth follow-up letter ask Lancet to retract it
