With hopes dimming that Kaiba would survive, doctors tried the medical equivalent of a "Hail Mary" pass.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

"He said, 'I've got a child who needs (a splint) now, ' " referring to Kaiba, said Green.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

What followed in Kaiba's case was a painstaking process of creating the splint on the printer in layers.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

"It was pretty nifty that (doctors) were able to make something for Kaiba on a printer like that, " April Gionfriddo said.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

The splint will take three years to degrade, and in the meantime, Kaiba's lung should continue to develop normally, said Green.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

Kaiba's procedure was described in a letter published in the most recent issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

Green then took the splint, measuring just a few centimeters long and 8 millimeters wide, and surgically attached it to Kaiba's collapsed bronchus.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

The next big step was getting a CT scan of Kaiba's lungs so that the splint could be fitted to his organs' exact dimensions.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

"It's magical to me, " said Dr. Glenn Green, an associate professor of pediatric otolaryngology at the University of Michigan who implanted the splint in Kaiba.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

Using an experimental technique never before tried on a human, they created a splint made out of biological material that effectively carved a path through Kaiba's blocked airway.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

While that work is being done, Kaiba's family remains grateful that, 15 months post-surgery and at age 18 months, he is still able to breathe on his own.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

But while cases like Kaiba's are a medical boon, both Terzic and the UM researchers stress that this and other regenerative procedures must be replicated in a wider patient population.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

"They had to do CPR on him every day, " said April Gionfriddo, Kaiba's mother, who later found out her son had a rare obstruction in his lungs called bronchial malacia.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

Green and Hollister got emergency clearance from their hospital and the Food and Drug Administration to try the experimental treatment -- which had been used only on animals -- on Kaiba.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby

"This case is a wonderful example that regenerative technologies are no longer science fiction, " said Dr. Andre Terzic, director of the Mayo Clinic Center for Regenerative Medicine, who was not involved in Kaiba's case.

CNN: 3-D printer helps save dying baby