Why doesn't IVF have better success rates if half the work is done?
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Anonymous
| This part really confuses me. I mean they get the eggs out and the sperm and create embryo's. Most of the time very decent embryo's. So I feel like so much of the hard part is done. So when they implant it back in your uterus, why is there still such a chance it won't work. I'm in the middle of doing my first IVF and I know I shouldn't focus on the negative, but I can't help but wonder. Why is it if half the work is done, that there is a chance the embryo/baby doesn't result in a pregnancy most of the time? I am planning on transferring one embryo at a time and so I suppose I feel like the odds should be better, but they feel like such a crapshoot. |
Anonymous
Well, getting egg to meet sperm and create an embryo isn't really "half" the work. It's a tiny fraction of the work. There's a lot that needs to happen between the creation of an embryo and live birth of a baby. You have to think about why most people are doing IVF in the first place. If you're not successfully getting pregnant through well-timed intercourse, there's a variety of things that could be wrong, some of which IVF can't fix. An older woman going through IVF is still going to face the issue of older eggs, for example; IVF doesn't solve the fact that egg or sperm may be chromosomally abnormal. Those embryos may develop for a time until the chromosome problems finally bring a halt to development. IVF also introduces another level of uncertainty when you talk about handling and manipulating these tiny cells. Are they handling the embryos correctly? Is it possible that some minute bit of damage is introduced to embryos by handling them during the IVF process? I don't think we have the answers to that yet, though labs are getting better and better at their procedures. There's also been some thought that all the drugs that women take during IVF make have some negative effect. I've read that some doctors recommend FET a month after retrieval to give those drugs a chance to leave your system. There are so many details that go into conception that we are only beginning to learn about. Doctors can control a handful of those details, but lots of stuff is not really up to a doctor's control. And it's the same during regular conception too -- a fertile young couple's chance of getting pregnant in any given month is somewhere in the 20-25 percent range. If IVF can boost your chances to the point where you're doing as well or better than as a fertile young couple, that's not bad. |
Anonymous
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It's all about getting the right egg to meet the right sperm and land in the right place.
Don't assume that just because you got many eggs through stimulation that the genetic material in each one was top-notch. The older the mother, the less availability for the top- notch eggs. And don't assume that in every one of those millions of sperm introduced to your eggs there is top-notch genetic material. The wonders of medicine cannot predict which ones will eventually stick and grow for another 9 months. |
Anonymous
| The hard truth is that you can only work with what you have. If there not good eggs or not good sperms, then you have a non viable embryo. There is more to reproduction than just the logistics of uniting sperm with the oocyte. Keeping in mind we are designed to ovulate one egg a month and with IVF you are stimulating multiple eggs, well some of those eggs in the youngest of patients are not going to be usable and most of those eggs in the older patients. |
Anonymous
| Also want to pipe in that implantation is another hurdle. When your body gets pregnant "outside" the body, and you introduce the embryo through a tube, it's another step to hope the body doesn't kick the embryo out thinking it's hostile. This is where we had our problems - got great embryos but they wouldn't implant. |
Anonymous
Not to be pedantic, but you don't "get pregnant outside the body." Your eggs can fertilize in vitro/outside the body, but a woman is not pregnant until an embryo implants in her uterus. |
Anonymous
| Age. Most women and men in IVF are "older" and no amount of science can really fix old eggs yet. So even if you still ovulate the majority of the eggs are damaged or have chromosomal issues (at least according to my RE). So yes, the RE helps things along. In hindsight I wish I had frozen my eggs at 30. I am pregnant now via IVF. If I had a daughter in her 20s now I would definitely try to talk to her about egg freezing. |
Anonymous
Then don't be. You know what this meant - the point is that the body doesn't know how to take a foreign substance since it didn't go the regular route. |
Anonymous
| The answer is that what you describe is a very simplistic version of what actually has to happen on a molecular level in order for conception and implantation to be successful. |
Anonymous
| To add a little hope to this conversation, for some women IVF can at least double the odds of getting pregnant in any given cycle. For example, my understanding is that women around age 30 trying to conceive naturally have about a 20% each month of getting pregnant. With IVF (at least for me), those odds went up to 40% for each cycle. Granted, a lot more goes into IVF than just having sex at the right time of month, but it is encouraging to know that the odds are better than couples the same age trying to conceive naturally. |
Anonymous
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Don't forget that once you do get pregnant that those first few weeks that the cells have to divide and split correctly and miraculously build the parts of a human being. It is a hell of a lot to ask of a few cells and it is amazing that it works as much as it does.
It really is the "God Factor" in the end that we cannot control. |
Anonymous
| It's because the majority of eggs and sperm aren't destined to become babies. The majority have some problem, even in young women. |
Anonymous
When a sperm fertilizes an egg, a new human life begins. That life may never implant in a womb, whether it is conceived in a dish or a Fallopian tube, but it has begun. S/he is just growing. When a woman conceives naturally, she is pregnant once there is conception. That is why very early losses, before implantation occurs, are called "chemical pregnancies." |
Anonymous
Um, no. A chemical pregnancy has implanted (that's how the "chemicals" or hcg can be measured) but hasn't continued to divide or implant fully for whatever reason. But if implantation hasn't happened at all, then there is no pregnancy. |
Ctella1216
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| A couple of other issues to consider when doing IVF (and I myself went through three rounds before becoming pregnant) - the lining of your uterus must be thick enough for the embryo to implant. That is sometimes a challenge for some women. Then, if there is implantation, it's got to "stick." There can be a lot of factors why a seemingly perfect embryo doesn't take. Try relaxation techniques (accupuncture, meditation) or some other holistic. |