scholarly journals Ethical and legal dilemmas in infertility treatment

Author(s):  
Svetlana Dragojevic-Dikic ◽  
Saveta Draganic ◽  
Srdjan Dikic ◽  
Vladimir Pilija

One of the main characteristics of the new millennium is the affirmation of human rights in all aspects of human existence, with the intention of turning declarative statements into reality. Development of up-to-date assisted reproductive technologies (ART) and their application in infertility treatment have raised numerous ethical, legal, religious, social and other questions. In vitro fertilization, donation of gametes, embryos and pre-embryos, cryopreservation of gametes, embryos, ovarian and testicular tissues, embryo transfer, genetic reproductive techniques, cloning and other sophisticated methods used in infertility treatment require cooperation between the medical and legal professions. Ethical aspects of human reproduction and assisted fertilization are based on full respect of the life of an individual even before conception, from pre-embryo stage, via embryo stage and fetus stage to a newborn infant. Regarding investigative and clinical projects, this standpoint implies the legalization of all ART procedures, unencumbered exchange of information and consensus about their application, and adherence to the basic ethical principles of autonomy benefit, justice and common welfare. Ethical postulates provide unequivocal directions in the creation of new life and resolve all possible ethical dilemmas, protecting the rights of doctors and participant in relevant procedures alike and reasserting the crucial principle - respect of human dignity.

2020 ◽  
Vol 69 (4) ◽  
pp. 83-88
Author(s):  
Svetlana S. Paskar ◽  
Alla S. Kalugina ◽  
Anna G. Tkachuk

The expansion of indications for assisted reproductive technology has led to significant implications for assisted reproductive technology (ART) programs worldwide. More than 7 million children in the world were born using ART. Modern clinical practice in the field of reproductive sciences is aimed not only at increasing the effectiveness, but also at the safety of treatment. ART, like any other type of therapy, may be combined with negative side effects. Both the correct prediction of the risks associated with treatment and a personalized approach ensure the absolute safety of infertility treatment using in vitro fertilization. In this regard, over the past decade, a number of new research approaches have been noted that use ART methods integrated into clinical practice: cycle segmentation with subsequent embryo transfer and the elective transfer of one embryo. New approaches provide a control in relation to ovarian stimulation and a reduction in the number of transferred embryos, which helps to minimize primarily adverse perinatal outcomes. Predicting the risks and outcomes of treatment using mathematical modeling is the application of good clinical practice.


Author(s):  
Jekaterina Avdotina ◽  
Aleksandra Mezecka-Oleinika ◽  
Vija Silina ◽  
Zane Vitina

Background: Women with endometriosis experience painful symptoms and/or infertility, others have no symptoms at all. According to European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology guidelines, surgery and assisted reproductive technologies (ART) are an appropriate treatment in cases of endometriosis-associated infertility. There are controversial data on the results of surgery and ART in patients with endometriosis.Methods: Retrospective analysis including 99 infertile patients aged between 25 and 48 years old. All of them had laparoscopic surgery as the primary option. 51 of them undergoing in vitro fertilization or intracytoplasmic sperm injection or frozen embryo transfer from 2003 through 2018 at SIA ‘Clinic EGV’.Results: The mean age of women was 34.2±4.5. In 56 (33.5%) cases was only surgery with 28 (50.9%) biochemical pregnancies and 26 (48.1%) live birth. In 111 (66.5%) cases there were surgery with ART with 48 (47.6%) biochemical pregnancies and 23 (22.7%) live birth. In 1 group patients mean age 30.7±4.6 and 2 group with mean age 35.1±4.2 (p=0.000). It was found that there is significant difference between endometriosis phenotype, infertility type, duration of infertility, repeated laparoscopic surgery, ART cycles, retrieved oocyte count and biochemical pregnancy rate.Conclusions: Patients with endometriosis related infertility should undergo surgical treatment as the primary option. Those patients who do not become pregnant after surgery must be treated with assisted reproductive technology. The optimal time to perform ART is first year after endometriosis surgery.


1999 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 455-477
Author(s):  
Judith F. Daar

The world of assisted reproductive technologies (ART) has forced our society to confront scenarios that were unimaginable a mere quarter century ago. The birth of Louise Brown in 1978, the first child conceived through in vitro fertilization (IVF), introduced to the world the notion of asexual reproduction. The bitter battle over the parental status of Baby M., a baby born by a surrogate mother in the early 1980s, engendered a public debate over the interaction between contract law, family law and reproductive liberties that still rages today. In 1992, the highly publicized divorce of Junior and Mary Sue Davis focused national attention on the issue of proper disposition of frozen embryos. This case highlighted the fact that conception and pregnancy could be separated by a significant amount of time as a result of cryopreservation. While each of these events marked a step forward in the march toward total technological mastery of human reproduction, they also suggest that future struggles involving ART will grow increasingly fierce and complicated as our fund of knowledge increased. This Article suggests that current disputes over the disposition of frozen embryos are emblematic of that struggle.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cornelius Nwoga ◽  
Nnanna Ikeh ◽  
Matthew Onodugo ◽  
Paul Baiyeri ◽  
Ndubuisi Machebe

Assisted reproductive technologies (ART) that have come to stay and are still being improved upon in developed countries are still in their infancy stage in developing countries like Nigeria. Nigeria’s cattle population is estimated to be around 18.4 million. The number is far insufficient to meet the country’s demand for meat, milk, and other cow products, let alone contribute to GDP. N’dama and Muturu are both Nigerian breeds that are resistant to trypanosomosis. They are humpless longhorn and humpless shorthorn types of beef cattle. The dairy and beef cow industries’ inadequate adoption of ART is partly to blame for Nigeria’s low cattle output. Sex determination, multiple-ovulation and embryo transfer (MOET), oestrus synchronization, artificial insemination (AI), in vitro fertilization (IVF), cloning, and genetic engineering are all examples of assisted reproductive technologies. It has been reported in humans, rodents and domestic animals, abnormal fetuses, newborns and adult offspring arise from ART. Improper matching of breeding animals mostly leads to overfat calves. This review centers on the applications and potentials of ART in the production of trypanotolerant N’dama and Muturu cattle breeds. Some unorthodox medicines which have proven effective in human reproduction can circumvent the shortfalls in the adoption of ART.


Anthropology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy Speier ◽  
Caridad Zamarripa

Reproductive technologies are those technologies that aid in animal and human reproduction. Assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) are more narrowly defined as those technologies that help people suffering from social or bodily infertility create a family. Socially infertile includes single women and men as well as homosexual couples who rely on donated gametes for the creation of a future child. Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) is usually the first step taken by couples having trouble conceiving. The most general type of reproduction technology is in vitro fertilization (IVF), which means that the egg is retrieved from a woman’s uterus and sperm is introduced to these eggs in a petri dish. In the case of male infertility, intracytoplasmic sperm injections (ICSI) may be employed, which means that sperm are injected directly into the egg. IVF may include the use of donated sperm, oocytes, and embryos. In addition to gamete donation, surrogacy may be employed in cases where an intended mother or intended gay fathers cannot carry a pregnancy to term. In addition to being used to create families, contraception is also considered a reproductive technology. Anthropologists have been conducting ethnographic analyses of reproductive technologies by studying the people intimately engaged with these varying technologies. Scholarship revolves around major questions about markets and gift exchange, kinship, and how our understandings of family have shifted with the advent of reproductive technologies, as well as globalization and the ways in which bodies, people, and technologies traverse the globe.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 315-328
Author(s):  
Maryna Petrushko ◽  
Volodymyr Piniaiev ◽  
Taisiia Yurchuk

The birth of children after infertility treatment of married couples with the help of assisted reproductive technologies has become a reality after many years of basic research on the physiology of reproductive system, development of oocyte’s in vitro fertilization methods and cultivation of embryos at pre-implantation stages. Given the widespread use of assisted reproductive technologies in modern medical practice and the great interest of society to this problem, the aim of the study was to trace the main stages and key events of assisted reproductive technologies in the world and in Ukraine, as well as to highlight the activities of outstanding scientists of domestic and world science who were at the origins of the development of this area. The paper used historical methods to study and interpret the texts of primary sources and present scientific historical events. In addition, the current trends in assisted reproductive technologies are covered based on the results of our own, more than 30 years of experience in the field of reproductive biology and medicine, and the achievements of world scientists. As a result of the work, it has been shown that despite certain ethical and social biases, the discovery of individual predecessor scientists became the basis for the efforts of Robert Edwards and Patrick Steptoe to ensure birth of the world's first child, whose conception occurred outside the mother's body. There are also historical facts and unique photos from our own archive, which confirm the fact of the first successful oocyte in vitro fertilization and the birth of a child after the use of assisted reproductive technologies in Ukraine. Over the last 20 years, assisted reproductive technologies have continued to grow, addressing many other issues of reproductive potential preservation and infertility treatment. State of the art methods of assisted reproductive technologies include the development of cryopreservation method of gametes and embryos by vitrification, genetic screening of embryos in order to prevent the hereditary diseases transmission and embryo transfer with chromosomal abnormalities, the birth of a child “from three parents” in severe cases of mutations in the mitochondrial genome, etc.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 19-42
Author(s):  
Alexandra A. Moskaleva

Assisted reproductive technologies (ART) are an infertility treatment tool. In Russia, more than 250 centers implementing infertility treatment with the help of ART have been opened in 67 regions. In 2014, in vitro fertilization (IVF) was included in the programme of state guarantees, and since 2016 the service can be obtained within the Mandatory Health Insurance (MHI) system. Author of this study analyzes how the impact of economic factors on fertility with the use of ART has changed in relation to the inclusion of IVF in the MHI system, and what social factors affect the usage of this technology. The analysis bases on the panel data for the regions of Russia covering the period from 2011 to 2017. The fixed effects method was used to assess the impact of various factors. The study shows that the population income level has a significant positive impact on the proportion of births with the use of ART even after the inclusion of IVF into the MHI programme. At the same time, the inclusion of IVF in the MHI programme has led to an increase in the proportion of births using ART. The positive effect of this inclusion is higher in wealthier regions. Among social factors, a significant impact has the accessibility of information about the procedure, which is measured by the share of population having access to the Internet.


GYNECOLOGY ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-116
Author(s):  
L A Bagdasaryan ◽  
I E Korneyeva

The aim of the study is to systematically analyze the data available in the modern literature on the relationship between endometrial thickness and the frequency of pregnancy in the program of assisted reproductive technologies (ART). Materials and methods. The review includes data from foreign and domestic articles found in PubMed on this topic. Results. The article presents data on the relationship between the thickness of the endometrium and the frequency of pregnancy in ART programs. The greatest number of studies is devoted to the evaluation of the relationship between the thickness of the endometrium and the frequency of pregnancy on the day of the ovulation trigger. Data are presented on the existence of a correlation between the thickness of the endometrium measured on the day of the ovulation trigger and the frequency of clinical pregnancy, as well as data on the need to evaluate the structure of the endometrium and the state of subendometric blood flow. The importance of multilayered (three-layered) endometrium as a prognostic marker of success in in vitro fertilization/intracytoplasmic sperm injection programs in the ovum is emphasized. The conclusion. The thickness of the endometrium can not be used as an argument for canceling the cycle or abolishing embryo transfer to the uterine cavity. Further studies in this direction are needed with a study of the morphological and molecular genetic characteristics of the endometrium, which in the future will allow us to evaluate the relationship between the thickness of the endometrium and the probability of pregnancy.


Author(s):  
N.A. Altinnik , S.S. Zenin , V.V. Komarova et all

The article discusses the factors that determine the content of the legal limitations of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis in the framework of the in vitro fertilization procedure, taking into account international experience and modern domestic regulatory legal regulation of the field of assisted reproductive technologies. The authors substantiates the conclusion that it is necessary to legislate a list of medical indications for preimplantation genetic diagnosis, as well as the categories of hereditary or other genetic diseases diagnosed in the framework of this procedure.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Monfort ◽  
Carmen Orellana ◽  
Silvestre Oltra ◽  
Mónica Rosello ◽  
Alfonso Caro-Llopis ◽  
...  

AbstractDevelopment of assisted reproductive technologies to address infertility has favored the birth of many children in the last years. The majority of children born with these treatments are healthy, but some concerns remain on the safety of these medical procedures. We have retrospectively analyzed both the fertilization method and the microarray results in all those children born between 2010 and 2019 with multiple congenital anomalies, developmental delay and/or autistic spectrum disorder (n = 486) referred for array study in our center. This analysis showed a significant excess of pathogenic copy number variants among those patients conceived after in vitro fertilization with donor oocyte with respect to those patients conceived by natural fertilization (p = 0.0001). On the other hand, no significant excess of pathogenic copy number variants was observed among patients born by autologous oocyte in vitro fertilization. Further studies are necessary to confirm these results and in order to identify the factors that may contribute to an increased risk of genomic rearrangements, as well as consider the screening for genomic alterations after oocyte donation in prenatal diagnosis.


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