One thing I wish I had known before IVF

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

I just wanted to let this group know how different clinics handle PGS results. Originally I was a patient at SGF, after two rounds of IVF I had one normal and two mosaic embryos. My normal didn’t implant. SGF would not let me implant my mosaics. Apparently 20-40% of all PGS tested embryos are mosaics. This means that the biopsy of the embryo has a percentage of both normal and abnormal cells. Lots of newer research suggests that these embryos lead to to healthy babies. No great meta analysis but after doing some research I’d say about 60% of euploids lead to healthy babies and about 40% of mosaics lead to a healthy birth (most of the rest fail to implant). After a ton of work, I was able to leave SGF and had my mosaic embryo transferred by Dr. Sacks at CFA. I’m 8 weeks pregnant today. PGS testing can be helpful to prioritize which embryos to transfer but so many possible healthy embryos are thrown away. CFA saved me from doing a third retrieval. I wish I had been aware of these policies before I had started my IVF journey and wanted to pass this knowledge along to others.

[Anonymous]

I was also stunned to read research on the topic that mosaic and even abnormal embryos could lead to healthy pregnancies, and it is certainly a hopeful option for women who have no euploid embryos. However, it’s also worth nothing that people can get pregnant with mosaic and aneuploid embryos, but there is a risk of miscarriage of the embryos are in fact not normal, and further testing in pregnancy is encouraged to make sure that it is a healthy baby. It’s unfortunately not as simple as just getting pregnant with these embryos. There was a great article about this several years back in the cut. But yes, mosaic and even abnormal embryos have led to healthy babies, which is an amazing discovery.

Wishing you the very best, OP, and a healthy pregnancy.

[Anonymous]

Congratulations and good luck to you, OP. Dr. Sacks is a gem.

[Anonymous]

Beware that Dominion automatically discards abnormal embryos despite there being a ton of reports of healthy live births from so-called "abnormal" embryos. Prior to consenting to PGS, I asked both the nurse Holi and Dr. DiMattina and both told me they held on to "abnormal" embryos. I had wanted these held in case as a backup. I later learned they destroyed my embryos. I really want to take legal action against them but I just don't have the emotional energy to.

The more I've looked into PGS the more I learned how inaccurate it is and I don't understand how any physician could recommend this. I think the reason they do is because it adds $5000 to a cycle and by discarding embryos with potential, forces people to do additional cycles which in turns generates more revenue. I can't believe there hasn't been a lawsuit related to PGS.