Can ART Kickstart Your Body's Natural Fertility?

Are the rumors true, that if you get pregnant using assisted reproductive technology, you might also later conceive via the old-fashioned way? An article on the Huffington Postwebsite by reporter Catherine Pearson offers up several women's stories with a conclusion of “Maybe.”


The stories, while excellent accounts of what many infertility patients struggle through to have a baby, amount to what we call “anecdotal evidence,” individual's experiences that don't necessarily hold up statistically for large groups of people. Some of my patients have said to me with hope in their voices, “Dr. Kristiansen, I have a friend who finally adopted a baby – and then got pregnant on her own!”

The reporter cites a couple of studies that build on the rumor:

• a French study published in 2012 in Fertility & Sterility, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine's journal, and

• a German study from 2008 published in Reproductive Biomedicine Online
  

In the French study, 24 percent of women who attempted IVF unsuccessfully went on to conceive spontaneously (that is, without fertility treatment.) The German study looked at patients who had successfully used ICSI with IVF (and so had a child), finding that 20 percent of them later conceived intentionally without fertility treatment, most within two years of their “ART baby's” delivery.


The still-untested theory is that the state of pregnancy, itself, may be healing for some forms of female infertility. Some also say that components of the fertility treatment process may also have a hand in kickstarting a woman's natural fertility levels, beyond the treatment cycle.


Both ideas make a sort of intuitive sense. I and my staff at Houston Fertility Center would love to be able to tell patients that spontaneous conception is something they can look forward down the road, should they want to have another baby. But even the French study's authors, after surveying more than 2,000 couples, call for conservative reason with their conclusion that “it should be remembered that the BSP [spontaneous pregnancy] rates are cumulative rates observed over a long period of time and that these couples have a very low monthly probability of conceiving.”

~ Dr. Sonja Kristiansen MD

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why Would a Woman Be a Surrogate?

image: freedigitalphotos.net

Of the many ways to use assisted reproductive technology for growing your family, perhaps no other produces more raised eyebrows as gestational surrogacy. That's understandable, especially in light of surrogacy's history and resulting legal issues.

Traditional surrogacy – in which the woman who carries the pregnancy is also the egg donor – is so fraught with potential issues that many fertility specialists and third-party matching agencies avoid it altogether. Instead, they and many infertile couples favor using gestational carriers – women who carry a pregnancy created by the IVF union of the couples' own eggs and sperm. Gestational surrogacy removes many of the legal and ethical issues from this infertility solution.

But there's still quite a bit of mystery in this process. The idea of a woman carrying a pregnancy and delivering a baby for another family to raise still makes some people uncomfortable. It's a very private experience, for the most part, so we don't often get to hear voices like Kymberli Barney's, a woman who experienced PCOS-related infertility and went on to become a gestational surrogate.

If you find yourself edging toward the idea that surrogacy might be your best option for finally having a baby, I encourage you to read Kymberli's brief story. And of course, as always, Houston Fertility Center staff will be happy to provide you with assistance in learning more about the incredible choice of surrogacy.

~ Dr. Sonja Kristiansen M.D.