Embryonic Arrest

[Anonymous]

Hi Everyone - I have a question for you all if you have the time.

We did our first cycle of IVF recently and had 15 mature eggs. Roughly half of them fertilized. They were checked on day 5 and all had stalled in development. I couldn't believe it. They waited until day 7 to see if anything would progress further but unfortunately there wasn't any development. The cycle was a bust. The clinic recommended a sperm donor for the next cycle.

I'm not sure if this is normal or if we should try another cycle with the same flare protocol. Did anyone get embryonic arrest before and go on to have a good blast or two on another attempt? It seems early to me to point this all to male factor.

Thanks!

[Anonymous]

Seems premature to use a sperm donor after one cycle with 7 fertilized eggs. What clinic is this? I would think about finding a new clinic.

The issue could be egg quality, how do they know that all the sperm were bad. I’m going to go on a limb and guess they had you on high stimming dosages. It’s better to have fewer eggs of high quality than many egg of low quality. I would suggest trying a new protocol.

[Anonymous]

Thanks! I'm 36, so I was surprised. The embryologist mentioned it may be egg quality but the doctor thought it was male factor (not sure why). I don't want to call out the clinic, but I was on Menopur and Gonal-F morning and night. I didn't produce 20-30 eggs, obviously, and didn't have OHSS. Is changing egg quality difficult?

[Anonymous]

The doctor should not merely think it’s male factor. Have they done tests to see if there’s fragmentation? It’s unusual to suggest donor egg/sperm after just one cycle. You can consult a urologist if you haven’t already done so.
Back in the day my RE recommended taking ubiquinol to improve egg quality. There is a whole list of supplements that are supposed to help with egg and sperm quality. The ones for egg quality are supposed to be taken for at least 3 months.

[Anonymous]

This is pretty bizarre that they’re suggesting donor sperm. I had 5 cycles and almost all of my embryos arrested. Eventually I was told to use donor eggs. My RE acts like it can’t possibly be a sperm problem.

[Anonymous]

They haven't done tests to see if there is fragmentation, no. The embryologist mentioned the eggs looked softer than she usually sees but not the worst ever. I'll try Ubiquinol, thanks!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They haven't done tests to see if there is fragmentation, no. The embryologist mentioned the eggs looked softer than she usually sees but not the worst ever. I'll try Ubiquinol, thanks!

I would suggest a second opinion in that case, if you can afford it. We had to move to donor sperm eventually , but only after several failed cycles and extensive testing.

[Anonymous]

My husband and I had almost exact same situation, even with The doctor bringing up donor sperm after fail #1 (which was extremely premature for him to do). My husband had lower numbers but nothing alarming and nothing known on my side. He got a varicocele repaired and a few mos later we did another round with the same clinic. There was better progression but still no blasts. Switched clinics and ended up with 3 Pgs normal blasts. Was it new clinic or more time after surgery? Who knows. Our first transfer failed and fingers crossed for second. Keep advocating for yourself!

[Anonymous]

Thank you! This is good to hear. Can I ask what clinic you went to?

[Anonymous]

I had this happen through 2 cycles and our RE was actually adamant it was egg quality that was the issue and suggested donor eggs. Mind you I was only 29 at the time so I was just floored... By some miracle, I was able to conceive on my own just a couple months later and then a second several years after that baby so really, who knows. I tend to think that the ivf protocols fried my eggs. The first was lupron stop and the second a microdose flare. I was on higher doses of meds to get ~10 eggs each time (decreased amh due to endometriosis) and I think that messed with the quality of the remaining eggs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you! This is good to hear. Can I ask what clinic you went to?

Our second clinic that resulted in blasts is SGF. There's no warm and fuzzies in your monitoring appointments, but it's such a well-oiled machine that we've had no issues at all. If our second transfer does not work we will go to Cornell.

[Anonymous]

We had the same issue over and over and went to donor egg and STILL didn’t work. That’s when I figured out on my own it was a sperm issue because the clinic was no help.

[Anonymous]

I’d give it another try. My first cycle (at age 41) gave us 11 eggs - but by day 5 no blasts/nothing to transfer. I had paid for two cycles, so we tried supplements for three months and did another round. This resulted in 3 blasts, two PGS normal, both of which took in separate FETs. The only thing we did differently in round two (besides supplements) was PICSI. My doctor at SGF wasn’t sure why the second try was so much better and did say there was a certain amount of chance/playing the numbers game in doing IVF. Good luck!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’d give it another try. My first cycle (at age 41) gave us 11 eggs - but by day 5 no blasts/nothing to transfer. I had paid for two cycles, so we tried supplements for three months and did another round. This resulted in 3 blasts, two PGS normal, both of which took in separate FETs. The only thing we did differently in round two (besides supplements) was PICSI. My doctor at SGF wasn’t sure why the second try was so much better and did say there was a certain amount of chance/playing the numbers game in doing IVF. Good luck!!!

Thanks! I am definitely giving it another try. I feel better knowing people had success even after a failure like this. Staying positive!!

[Anonymous]

There r a number of threads related to this issue. It happened to me on multiple rounds. DH has severe MF and I thought it might be the cause, but it wasn’t. Unless you have major dna fragmentation or zero sperm, MF isn’t likely the problem. Egg quality is a bigger issue. The stim meds can make a difference too. Higher doses of menopure seem not to work well for some. Unfortunately, there isn’t much data to show what the actual issue is. For me, the docs used lots of meds to get higher numbers of eggs saying it’s a numbers game so more is better. Then I switched and did a round with less meds and while I got fewer eggs I got a high percentage of blasts. Maybe it was a fluke, but it was my 6th round and totally opposite of how the prior rounds went.