Woman With Two Uteruses Delivers Twins, Defies One-In-Five Million Odds

Earlier this year we wrote about a woman who got pregnant while already pregnant (the babies were conceived at different times and carried in two separate sacs). Crazy, right? Her odds were around a million to one. But that’s nothing compared to a Florida woman who last week gave birth to twins from two separate uteruses. Her odds? One in five million.

Andrea Barbosa has a rare condition called didelphys that affects around one in 2,000 women. That means that she has two uteruses, a condition that can cause infertility, miscarriage or premature birth. But 24-year-old Barbosa, already mom to a two-year-old daughter, had none of these effects and she delivered healthy fraternal twins a boys, Nathan, and a girl, Natalie at 36 weeks by c-section.

“I was shocked to learn I had a baby in each uterus,” Barbosa said in a written statement released by Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater, Florida, where the babies were born. According the report, there have only been 100 known cases worldwide of women with uterus didelphys being pregnant in both uteruses at the same time.

For those wondering and aren’t we all? Barbosa conceived the two babies at the same time in separate uteruses. Her obstetrician, Dr. Patricia St. John, said the odds are on in five million. She told CBS News that a woman has to release two eggs at the same time and both must be fertilized and implanted successfully in two different uteruses (not an easy task!).

It’s a lovely story and we wish Barbosa and her family all the best. Oh, and we suggest she go out and buy a lottery ticket – stat!

(Photo: Baycare Health System)