"iPhone Baby" Not So New; More Fertility 101 Needed

Here's an eye-catching piece: an article about a young woman who finally conceived after years of infertility -- all because of an iPhone app.

Essentially all that happened here was good (and successful -- congratulations!) use of an old TTC standard done up in new technology. The app she downloaded was one of apparently several that counts a woman's cycle days and flags her when she should be at her most fertile.

Keyword here is "should"...

One of the most common reasons that some women don't get pregnant easily is ovulatory disorder. There are plenty of ways that a woman's ovulation can become disrupted, out of sync, or cease altogether. The important thing to know is that very often, the woman has no symptoms to clue her in to her body's fertility problem. Simply having a period, even regularly, doesn't necessary mean ovulation is occurring on target.

So, yes, timing is crucial in trying to get pregnant. But for a 30-year-old to have tried unsuccessfully for *four years* and still only then resort to counting the days in her cycle... that tells me our fertility educational efforts aren't getting out there like we hope, whether or not the technology is a calendar on the wall or an iPhone app.

Our Presentation at ASRM: More Pieces of the Pregnancy Puzzle

We were pleased to have our poster presentation accepted into this year's meeting of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. The title -- Differential Relationship Between the Total Number of Oocytes Retrieved and the Implantation Rate in IVF and ICSI Patients -- may sound dry, but our results were positive news for patients who need IVF to have a baby.

The Houston Infertility Clinic staff, in conjunction with the Department of OB/Gyn at the University of Sydney in Australia, examined 351 IVF cycles. In each case, patients were using their own eggs and non-frozen embryos. We looked at:

the number of eggs retrieved
number of embryos transferred
results of clinical pregnancy tests

Next we compared those cycles that included ICSI and those that used "conventional" IVF for insemination. These two groups were then split up into three sub-groups, based on the number of eggs that were retrieved (either 1-10 eggs, 11-20 eggs, or 21-40 eggs.)

It might seem a simple question of statistical odds that the more eggs you produce, the better your chances, but...

Here's the good news: We concluded that, at least in our hands, patients using ICSI who were in the 11-20 egg group had the highest implantation rate. Patients using "conventional" IVF w/o ICSI had higher implantation rates when they were in the subgroup producing the most eggs (21-40 eggs).

It's important to note that quality of eggs -- rather than quantity -- is the more important measure. Patients shouldn't be discouraged if their bodies aren't producing a high number of eggs. As our study indicates, the use of ICSI seems to make a noticeable difference in outcome.

On a related note -- in some cases, women's ovaries will produce far fewer eggs than everyone hoped for in an IVF cycle. Different clinics have different policies; many are, frankly, guided by heavy concern about success rate statistics.

Our policy is that if a patient wants to move forward and retrieve the one follicle that her ovary brought forth, we will respect her wishes and do our best to render highest quality care toward the best possible outcome.

We want every patient to have a fighting chance at getting pregnant.

You Asked For It: Predicting Ov with PCOS

One of my readers asked me to discuss PCOS, in conjunction with my earlier comments on using ovulation predictor kits at home.

It's true that PCOS and several other ovulatory disorders can make home ovulation prediction a very inaccurate process. If you're determined to use at-home testing kits, try to look at the results as information that is helpful but that may not be giving you the full picture of your ovulatory function.

A very important point here: regular menses does not necessarily mean you are ovulating during every cycle. Women with PCOS come with a range of cycles -- from amenorrhea (completely absent periods) to wildly irregular cycles to fairly consistent menstrual periods.

In short, when a woman has PCOS or other ovulatory disorders, menstruation and ovulation may be different, seemingly unrelated events. You can't always use "Aunt Flo" as an indicator of how well your ovaries are working.