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More than six million Americans experience the inability to conceive even after a year of unprotected sex. For first time parents it is very hard to understand the root of the problem and find a solution. This is known as infertility and it affects around 10 percent of the male and female population of reproductive age. Assisted Reproductive Technology is used to treat this condition. One of the most important and common type assisted reproductive technology is In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF) where the egg is fertilized by the sperm outside the body and then it is implanted into the uterus of the woman hoping for a successful pregnancy.
IVF technique was successfully used for the first time in the year 1978 in England the baby born was named Louise Brown. The babies born like this are also referred to as ‘Test tube babies’. 90 percent of the babies born using ART are through the IVF technique. IVF process involves five steps. First the woman’s ovaries are stimulated to produce multiple eggs by administering hormones for a period of 8 to 14 days, which are then retrieved by a simple surgical procedure known as transvaginal ultrasound aspiration. The retrieved eggs are examined and the healthy ones are separated and placed in IVF culture media and the most motile sperms from the father were added to the eggs after separating them from the semen and then incubated. The fertilization taken place within hours of insemination which is confirmed visually by observing the presence of 2 pronuclei after 24 hours by the doctors. Blastocyst will be formed five days after the fertilization which will later on form placenta and fetal tissue. The resulting embryos are then transferred into the uterus of the woman. The embryo attaches to the uterine wall and ensures pregnancy. The normal development of the fetus then follows.
