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Chapter 28 - Adjuvant Treatment and Alternative Therapies to Improve Fertility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2019

Jane A. Stewart
Affiliation:
Newcastle Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
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Summary

With initial attempts of failed IVF, and also after miscarriages, it is quite common for women to assume and become convinced that there is a problem in the uterus or their body leading to the “rejection” of the embryos. This may be true for some women, but it is difficult to detect and predict which women this applies to. In fact, chromosomal errors in the embryos are probably the main underlying reason behind all reproductive failures, but uterine factors may have a role [1]. A recent analysis of more than 15,000 high grade blastocysts showed 30–90% were aneuploid, increasing significantly with a woman’s age [2]. Sometimes pre-implantation genetic screening (PGS) is useful either prior to or in conjunction with adjuvant treatment to assess the necessity and limit the number of embryo transfer cycles and repeated use of adjuvant treatments.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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