Women who cannot have IVF or have sudden ovarian failure, cancer, or for other reasons cannot have drugs to stimulate their ovaries to mature eggs, were given fresh hope yesterday when doctors in Canada announced the birth of the first baby that was born from an egg that was harvested while immature, matured in a test tube and then frozen and thawed to be used later.
The baby girl is now about one year old. Her mother has polycystic ovarian syndrome which means she could not receive the usual hormonal treatment to mature her eggs as this would over stimulate her ovaries. Overstimulated ovaries cause follicles to swell up and absorb fluid which leads to kidney failure.
The research that produced the new experimental treatment was conducted by Hanahel Holzer and colleagues at the McGill Reproductive Centre in Montreal.
The study was reported by Holzer to the 23rd annual meeting of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) which is taking place in Lyon, France, this week.
Holzer and colleagues took unmatured eggs from the prospective mother’s ovaries and matured them in the lab using hormones. The eggs were then frozen to be thawed later when needed.
Three other women from the 20 who took part in the study are also expecting babies.
Holzer said this is the first time that both maturation of eggs in the lab and the subsequent freezing for later use has been done in one procedure and led to a healthy birth; the two steps have been used fairly routinely on their own before for treating infertility.
The researchers collected a total of 295 immature eggs from 20 volunteer women with an average age of 30 years. 68 per cent of the eggs were good enough to go ahead to the hormone maturation stage in the lab and of these 74 per cent successfully underwent freezing, thawing and subsequent fertilization. An average of 3 embryos were implanted in each woman. Four women became pregnant, all of them with single babies.
This new method could have a number of benefits. Regular ovarian stimulation takes up to six weeks and women who have sudden ovarian failure may not have enough time to save their eggs for later use. This method would allow them to rescue eggs quickly and have them mature outside of their bodies and freeze them before it is too late, said Holzer.
Also, women with breast cancer could have immature eggs removed and matured in the lab without running the risk of the cancer being exacerbated by the regular hormone treatment to mature the eggs inside their bodies, or without having to delay time critical cancer treatment while they have the six weeks of hormone injections to mature and then harvest eggs.
The method has not been tested on women with cancer, said Holzer, although they may well be the ones most likely to want to use this method to secure their fertility.
Holzer said he could also see that healthy women might want to use this method to extend their fertility into middle age, without having to have hormone injections. For instance, women without partners, who are in their mid 30s could freeze their eggs using this method, he said to the delegates.
Click here for information on How to Choose a Fertility Clinic in the US (WebMD).
Written by: Catharine Paddock
Writer: Medical News To