Infertility is one of the major medical concerns of the 21st century. According to the World Health Organization, 15% of couples encounter infertility. In India, the rate of primary infertility is between 3.9% and 16.8%. With so many couples facing difficulty with natural conception, many are undergoing fertility treatments like IVF. If you are contemplating undergoing the IVF process, this blog will guide you.

(Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/voices/how-ivf-stands-tall-in-india-with-increasing-success-rates/) 

IVF, or in vitro fertilization, is a medical procedure that helps with fertility and facilitates the conception of a child. The doctors retrieve the eggs and sperm from the mother and father. They fertilize the egg with the sperm in the lab, after which the fertilized embryo is transplanted into the uterus. This entire process is one complete cycle of IVF, which can take about three weeks. 

The IVF process is complex, and one cycle happens in multiple stages, as discussed below: 

It is more like the preparatory stage, where the doctor prescribes medicines and injectable hormones to stimulate the ovaries. Whether you are using your eggs or getting them from a donor, ovarian stimulation helps in the production of multiple quality eggs, instead of one, which the body produces naturally every month. Multiple eggs increase the chances of getting one viable embryo during the procedure. The process of ovarian stimulation continues for over ten days, after which the doctors retrieve the eggs.

Once you get the final trigger shot for maturing eggs (included in the ovarian stimulation stage), the doctor will collect the eggs within 36 hours. It is a time-sensitive process because delaying the process can cause the loss of eggs. You will get an intravenous sedative, and the doctor will retrieve the eggs from the follicles through needle aspiration guided by transvaginal ultrasound. It takes about 20 minutes to collect the eggs, roughly. 

For couples using their partner’s sperm, the doctor will ask for the semen sample on the morning of the fertilization procedure. Before the collection, some usual tests regarding the quality of the sperm are performed in the lab to assess the success of fertilization.

Once the doctor has the eggs and the sperm, it’s time to fertilize the embryo. In a conventional IVF process, the eggs are inseminated in a petri dish, and left to incubate through the night. That’s the natural process. In some cases, doctors use the ICSI technique. Here, the sperm is injected into the eggs. The medical team will wait 20 hours to see if the fertilization has succeeded. After that, the embryo grows in the lab for about six days before being transferred to the uterus. 

Even after the egg retrieval, the other woman has to stay on hormonal injections to prepare the uterus for the embryo. On the day of the transfer, the doctor inserts a flexible and soft tube like a catheter into the uterus, injecting the embryo inside. Within two weeks after the transfer of the embryo, there will be a blood test to determine pregnancy. 

That’s how an IVF process works. However, it’s important to remember that not everyone conceives in a single attempt. If you are seeking a reliable and reputable medical facility for a successful IVF, consult with the specialists at Ace Medicare. You can check out the details here.