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Studies show that 6.1 million people in the United States are affected by infertility. This means that over 10% of the reproductive age population aren’t able to conceive. One of the solutions for the infertility problem is in vitro fertilization.In vitro fertilization is a procedure used when there is a very small probability of a sperm fertilizing an egg or when the woman’s oviducts are blocked. Here it is how the procedure works:
First of all the woman receives hormone injections for 10 days to stimulate her ovaries to produce more than 20 eggs during the monthly cycle,not just one as usual. Afterwards the doctor collect these eggs through a small incision in the woman’s abdomen or using a needle that is inserted through the top of the vagina and mixes them with an appropriate number of sperm in a laboratory dish. The name of the procedure comes from the glass tube or dish translated from Latin,”in vitro” means “in glass”. The eggs are fertilized and after a couple of days later the multicellular embryos are placed in the woman’s uterus. If the sperm can’t fertilize the egg because they can’t swim to it, then the doctor can insert a sperm in the cytoplasm of each egg with the help of a microscop. The procedure is called intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection. After two days two or three of the fertilized eggs are palced in the woman’s uterus. From this point forward the woman’s body begins taking care of the embryos. In half of the cases in vitro fertilization leads to a pregnancy.
In in vitro fertilization, eggs are removed from the woman's ovaries and mixed with the man's sperm in a dish in a laboratory. Once the egg have been fertilized with the sperm, they are implanted in the women’s uterus . Here are some useful informations about IVF procedure, answers at the most frequent questions. The entire procedure of in vitro fertilization lasts 4-6 weeks. Both partners should be available and ready to spend approximately 12 hours at the IVF clinic for the egg retrieval and fertilization. After a couple of days the women returns at the clinic for the transfer of the embryos to the uterus. The egg retrieval is done under anaesthesis,the process takes 20-30 minutes and the pain afterwards is almost inexistent. The eggs are retrieved with a needle with the help of ultrasound. Even though there’s no age limit,the women over 45 years have a diminish chance of successful pregnancy. After the embryos transfer to the uterus within 2 weeks a pregnancy test is performed and if it’s positive then the procedure was successful. For ensuring a succsseful pregnancy more than one embryos are implanted into the uterus,but this can lead to multiple births thet can affect the helth of the babies already conceived. Studies show that 10-25% of women who undergo in vitro fertilization procedure have twins. The chances of success with the IVF procedure can’t be predicted because a large number of factors are involved. What is sure is that the success rate is bigger if the female is younger. Women with blocked,damaged or absent fallopian tubes can appeal to the IVF treatment. The side effects of this treatment are:risk of ectopic pregnancy (the embryo implants in the fallopian tubes not in the uterus). Studies showed that in vitro fertilization procedure is safe and doesn’t cause birth defects. Unfortunately in vitro fertilization is an expensive treatment and the majority policies don’t cover it. |