What is the IVF Treatment Process?
The first step in IVF involves fertility drugs, which are used to stimulate a woman’s ovaries into producing multiple eggs (rather than the one egg that develops normally each month). You will have regular transvaginal ultrasounds and blood tests during this phase. Once your ovaries produce multiple eggs, you’ll receive another medication to help prepare the lining of your uterus for an embryo transfer.
Then, your doctor will introduce sperm into your eggs. In this process, called insemination, sperm are typically mixed with the best quality eggs from your cycle. It takes just a few hours for the eggs to become fertilized. If the chance of fertilization is low, your doctor can also inject sperm directly into the egg using a procedure called intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI).
About six days after insemination, an embryo will “hatch” from its outer membrane, called the zona pellucida, and implant into the uterus. Your doctor may recommend a procedure called assisted hatching, in which a hole is made in the zona pellucida just before transfer to increase the likelihood of successful implantation. This procedure is often performed for older women or those who have had multiple failed IVF Treatment Process attempts.
Embryos are monitored closely in the lab to make sure that they’re growing well. In addition, the laboratory staff will check to see if any of the embryos have developed chromosomal abnormalities, which can lead to a miscarriage or other serious problems in pregnancy. For couples who are at a high risk of passing on genetic disorders to their child, your doctor may recommend pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), in which laboratory staff remove a single cell from each embryo and screen them for any abnormalities.
Once the eggs have matured, your doctor will give you a 'trigger shot' of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), which sets ovulation in motion. Approximately 36 hours after this trigger, you’ll come into the state-of-the-art ART lab at our fertility clinic for egg retrieval. The procedure is simple and painless, and usually takes place while you are awake.
After the eggs are retrieved, they’ll be screened for chromosomal abnormalities and cultured to the blastocyst stage (about 18 - 20 cells). Your doctor will then select an embryo or embryos for transfer to your uterus. Most couples choose to transfer more than one embryo in the hopes that at least one will implant and grow. However, a multiple pregnancy increases the risks of complications for both the mother and fetus.
For women who have significant medical issues that could put them at risk of a complication from a pregnancy (such as Marfan syndrome, New York Heart Association class 3 or 4 heart failure, severe valvular stenosis, or coarctation of the aorta), IVF with oocyte aspiration and fertilization, followed by gestational carrier transfer, is an option. This allows women to become biological mothers, while minimizing the risks associated with a natural pregnancy.
Comments
Post a Comment