IVF Process- The Journey Towards Fertility

IVF process basically involves the fertilization process of the egg with the sperm and the embryo transfer in the uterus and the whole procedure is done in a clinical laboratory. The IVF technique was initially designed for those women who had the problem of tubal infertility and in IVF the fallopian tubes are bypassed completely.

The procedure starts from the retrieval of the eggs from the woman's body and they are inseminated with the semen of her partner or a donor and the whole process is carried out in the lab. And the second phase of the treatment involves the transfer of the fertilized eggs or the embryo in the woman's uterus.

Prior to the treatment you would be advised some medications and you should follow the total instructions including the activities restrictions also. Egg retrieval is done after 36 hours of the maturity of the eggs and usually it is removed by following the guidance of ultrasound by laproscopy. Light anesthesia is administered in the whole process. The eggs along with the surrounding liquid is removed and sent to the embryology lab. The recovery time for this procedure involves one to one and a half hours. The eggs are tested for the maturity and incubated. If fresh semen is used, the male partner is asked to collect a sperm sample and the semen analysis is done after that. These are the basic steps of the IVF process and the procedure might differ with the clinic or the doctor.

Then the egg and the sperm are placed in the growth media, which contains a special type of liquid that contains nutrients that help them to live outside the body. The egg here gets fertilized and becomes an embryo, which is allowed to grow and divide in the laboratory for 2-5 days. After this the embryo is carefully transferred into the uterus of the woman and is placed at the right place and this process is critically important. The healthcare providers prefer to transfer more than one embryo so that the success rate for pregnancy increases. However the success rate of the pregnancy also depends upon the woman's age, the success of the clinic and the quality of the embryo.

The whole procedure of the IVF process has to be done very carefully and taking each and every precaution needed. There are some precautions that have to be taken during the treatment time.