scholarly journals A Review of Outcome Data concerning Children Born following Assisted Reproductive Technologies

2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Dupont ◽  
Christophe Sifer

Assisted reproductive technologies (ARTS) are used for more than 30 years to help infertile couples. Concerns about long-term health of children conceived following ART have led to start follow-up studies. Despite methodological limitations and discrepant results, many of the studies and meta-analyses have reported an increased risk of birth defects after ART. Etiologies may be multiple births, a major drawback of ART, parents' subfertility, or technologies themselves. Prematurity and intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR) seem to cause most of the pathologies reported in ART children. Nevertheless, epigenetic disorders need to be followed up since increases of imprinting diseases were reported. Consequently, alteration of gametes and early embryo development with ART may have consequences on children health since periconceptional period is critical for long-term development. Yet general condition of most of children conceived with ART is reassuring, but long-term followup is still strongly needed.

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 629-634
Author(s):  
K.A. Kuzmichev ◽  

Infertility is an important medical and social problem. Increasing numbers of infertile couples lead to an increase in the use of assisted reproductive technologies (ART), which is reflected in the increasing number of children born using these methods. Literature provides information on the specific features of neonatal and early postnatal diseases in such children, showing significantly lower health parameters compared to children born in result of spontaneous pregnancy. The issue of the long-term health status of children born after ART is still controversial. The first major meta-analyses have appeared quite recently permitting to reliably assess the morbidity of children born after ART. This review presents evidence that summarizes the current data on the morbidity of children born after ART. It shows the absence of a reliable difference in the level of occurrence of neoplastic processes, development of metabolic and psychiatric diseases. There is an increased risk of vascular-endothelial dysfunction, arterial hypertension, cardiovascular diseases. Contradictory data were obtained on the impact of ART methods on reproductive function: a decrease in ejaculate quality was observed in boys born after intracytoplasmic sperm injection. The presented data make it possible to form an idea on this issue, however, within the general morbidity framework. Nosological characteristics and the determination of incidence of certain diseases still remain a relevant task and require special large-scale prospective studies and observation of children born after ART throughout their lives to establish more accurate correlations.


2019 ◽  
Vol 63 (3-4-5) ◽  
pp. 217-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federica Zacchini ◽  
Silvestre Sampino ◽  
Adrian M. Stankiewicz ◽  
Thomas Haaf ◽  
Grazyna E. Ptak

Since the birth of the first baby conceived by in vitro fertilization (IVF), assisted reproductive technologies (ART) have been constantly evolving to accomodate needs of a growing number of infertile couples. Rapidly developing ART procedures are directly applied for human infertility treatment without prior long-term safety evaluation. Although the majority of ART babies are healthy at birth, a comprehensive assessment of the long-term risks associated with ART is still lacking. An increased risk of epigenetic errors has been associated with the use of ART, which may contribute to the onset of civilization disease later in adolescence/adulthood and/or in subsequent generations. Therefore, our investigations should not focus on (or be limited to) the occurrence of a few very rare imprinting disorders in ART children, which might be associated with parental age and/or the use of ART, but on the possibly increased disease susceptibilities later in life and their potential transmission to the subsequent generations. Retrospective studies do not offer exhaustive information on long-term consequences of ART. Animal models are useful tools to study long-term effects including transgenerational ones and the epigenetic risk of a given ART procedure, which could then be translated to the human context. The final goal is the establishment of common guidelines for assessing the epigenetic risk of ART in humans, which will contribute to two key objectives of the Horizon2020 programme, i.e. to improve our understanding of the causes and mechanisms underlying health and disease, and to improve our ability to monitor health and prevent/manage disease.


2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 388-402 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Chen ◽  
L. K. Heilbronn

Concerns have been raised about the health and development of children conceived by assisted reproductive technologies (ART) since 1978. Controversially, ART has been linked with adverse obstetric and perinatal outcomes, an increased risk of birth defects, cancers, and growth and development disorders. Emerging evidence suggests that ART treatment may also predispose individuals to an increased risk of chronic ageing related diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. This review will summarize the available evidence on the short-term and long-term health outcomes of ART singletons, as multiple pregnancies after multiple embryos transfer, are associated with low birth weight and preterm delivery, which can separately increase risk of adverse postnatal outcomes, and impact long-term health. We will also examine the potential factors that may contribute to these health risks, and discuss underlying mechanisms, including epigenetic changes that may occur during the preimplantation period and reprogram development in utero, and adult health, later in life. Lastly, this review will consider the future directions with the view to optimize the long-term health of ART children.


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.


Life ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 728
Author(s):  
Eguzkine Ochoa

Assisted reproductive technologies (ART) are the treatment of choice for some infertile couples and even though these procedures are generally considered safe, children conceived by ART have shown higher reported risks of some perinatal and postnatal complications such as low birth weight, preterm birth, and childhood cancer. In addition, the frequency of some congenital imprinting disorders, like Beckwith–Wiedemann Syndrome and Silver–Russell Syndrome, is higher than expected in the general population after ART. Experimental evidence from animal studies suggests that ART can induce stress in the embryo and influence gene expression and DNA methylation. Human epigenome studies have generally revealed an enrichment of alterations in imprinted regions in children conceived by ART, but no global methylation alterations. ART procedures occur simultaneously with the establishment and maintenance of imprinting during embryonic development, so this may underlie the apparent sensitivity of imprinted regions to ART. The impact in adulthood of imprinting alterations that occurred during early embryonic development is still unclear, but some experimental evidence in mice showed higher risk to obesity and cardiovascular disease after the restriction of some imprinted genes in early embryonic development. This supports the hypothesis that imprinting alterations in early development might induce epigenetic programming of metabolism and affect long-term health. Given the growing use of ART, it is important to determine the impact of ART in genomic imprinting and long-term health.


2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 3985-3991
Author(s):  
Victoria Atanasova ◽  
◽  
Petar Ivanov ◽  
Elitsa Gyokova ◽  
Desislava Georgieva ◽  
...  

Objective: To evaluate the outcome of the extremely low birth weight newborns (ELBWNs) from single and twin pregnancies. Material and methods: The study lasts from 2005 to 2017 and includes all life born ELBWNs treated in University Hospital, Pleven, Bulgaria. Patients' groups: singletons (1) and twins (2); twins conceived naturally(2.1) and after assisted reproductive technologies – ART(2.2). Results: One hundred and eighty two (182) ELBWNs are examined, 65 (35.7%) of them are twins. The twins, compared to singletons, are significantly more often conceived by ART (47.7 vs 4.3%, p<0.001) and significantly more rarely infected prenatally (18 vs 41%, p 0.002). The survival rate is 51.3% for singletons and 56.6% for twins, NS. Survived twins (n 37) achieve later their optimal nutritive tolerance (30±11 vs 25±10 days, p 0.046), require more blood transfusions (3.6±1.9 vs 2.6±1.8 per patient, p 0.009) and longer mechanical ventilation (16±15 vs 9±12 days, p 0.03) than survival singletons (n 60). The twins suffer more often from intraventricular haemorrhage (46 vs 18%, p 0.004), patent ductus arteriosus (35 vs 15%, p 0.02) and long-term complications (51 vs 30%, p 0.04) than singletons. ART-twins (n 31)compared to the subgroup 2.1 (n 34) are more frequently intubated in the delivery room (81 vs. 50%, p 0.01)but suffer less frequently from nosocomial infections (53 vs. 85%, p 0.03). Conclusions: According to our data, ELBW-twins frequently suffer from respiratory, haemorrhagic, and gastrointestinal problems than ELBW-singletons, resulting in more long-term complications. Our study proves that ART does not influence the outcome in multiples.


2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 77-87 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mostafa Metwally ◽  
William L. Ledger

Author(s):  
Marie Thoma ◽  
Carie Cox ◽  
Jasmine Fledderjohann ◽  
Rudolph Kantum Adageba

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Global Public Health. Please check back later for the full article. Infertility remains a neglected area in sexual and reproductive health, yet its consequences are staggering. Infertility is estimated to impact about 15% (estimates range from 48 million to 180 million) of couples of reproductive age worldwide. It is associated with adverse physical and mental health outcomes, financial distress, severe social stigma, increased risk of domestic abuse, and marital instability. While men and women are equally likely to be infertile, women often bear the societal burden of infertility, particularly in societies where a woman’s identity and social value is closely tied to her ability to bear children. Despite these consequences, disparities in access to infertility treatment between low- and high-income populations persist, given the high cost and limited geographic availability of diagnostic services and assisted reproductive technologies. In addition, a significant proportion of infertility arises from preventable factors, such as smoking, sexually transmitted infections, pregnancy-related infection or unsafe abortion, and environmental contaminants. Accordingly, programs that address the equitable prevention and treatment of infertility are not only in keeping with a reproductive rights perspective, but can also improve public health. However, progress on infertility as a global concern in the field of sexual and reproductive health and rights is stymied by challenges in understanding the global epidemiology of infertility, including its causes and determinants, barriers to accessing quality infertility care, and a lack of political will and attention to this issue. Tracking and measurement of infertility is highly complex, resulting in considerable ambiguity about its prevalence and stratification of reproduction globally. A renewed global focus on infertility epidemiology, risk factors, and access to and receipt of quality of care will support individuals in trying to reach their desired number and spacing of children and improve overall health and well-being.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (17) ◽  
pp. 4169
Author(s):  
Marina La Rovere ◽  
Marica Franzago ◽  
Liborio Stuppia

About 1–4% of children are currently generated by Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) in developed countries. These babies show only a slightly increased risk of neonatal malformations. However, follow-up studies have suggested a higher susceptibility to multifactorial, adult onset disorders like obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases in ART offspring. It has been suggested that these conditions could be the consequence of epigenetic, alterations, due to artificial manipulations of gametes and embryos potentially able to alter epigenetic stability during zygote reprogramming. In the last years, epigenetic alterations have been invoked as a possible cause of increased risk of neurological disorders, but at present the link between epigenetic modifications and long-term effects in terms of neurological diseases in ART children remains unclear, due to the short follow up limiting retrospective studies. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge about neurological disorders promoted by epigenetics alterations in ART. Based on data currently available, it is possible to conclude that little, if any, evidence of an increased risk of neurological disorders in ART conceived children is provided. Most important, the large majority of reports appears to be limited to epidemiological studies, not providing any experimental evidence about epigenetic modifications responsible for an increased risk.


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