Objective To investigate the relationship between serum progesterone level at the day with human chorionic gonadotrophin (hCG) administration and pregnant outcome from in in-vitro fertilization-embryo transfer(IVF-ET). Methods From Mar. 2002 to Apr. 2007, 786 cycles with serum progesterone measurement on the day of hCG administration for final oocyte maturation in IVF were analyzed retrospectively in Reproductive Medicine Center in First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University.All stimulations were down-regulated with gronadotrophin release hormone agonist (GnRH-a) in both long protocols and short protocols before gonadotrophin stimulation. When the thresholds of serum progesterone were set at 5.5, 6.0,6.5,7.0,7.5,8.0,8.5 and 9.0 nmol/L, respectively. If the level of progesterone was less than the thresholds, those patients were in lower progesterone group, on the contrary, more than the threshold value, those patients were in higher progesterone group. The laboratory results and the clinical outcomes between all patients at lower and higher progesterone group at different thresholds value were analyzed. Results The rate of normal fertilization, quality embryos, successful implantation, chemical pregnancy, clinical pregnancy and live birth did not exhibit remarkable difference between patients with higher and lower serum progesterone level at multiple thresholds on the day of hCG administration in the 786 cycles (P >0.05). However, when the thresholds of serum progesterone were at 8.5 and 9.0 nmol/L, early abortion rates of 27.3% (3/11) and 3/7 in higher progesterone group were significantly higher than 8.8% (26/297) and 8.6% (26/301) in lower progesterone group (P<0.05). And the total abortion rates of 3/7 in higher progesterone group were significantly higher than 11.0% (34/301) in lower progesterone group when the thresholds of serum progesterone were 9.0 nmol/L (P<0.05). Conclusions This study did not prove the correlationship between progesterone level at the clay with hCG administration and the probability of clinical pregnancy or live birth. However, early abortion rates or the total abortion rates were associated with higher progesterone level when the thresholds of serum progesterone were at 8.5 nmol/L or 9.0 nmoL/L.

OBJECTIVETo discuss the applied value of rescue intracytoplasmic sperm injection(ICSI) after complete fertilization failure during in vitro fertilization (IVF) cycles.

METHODSAfter 16-18 h co-culture with sperm, all the unfertilized oocytes with the first polar body were re-fertilized by ICSI.

RESULTSAfter rescue ICSI, the abnormal fertilization rate was 17.9% and the normal fertilization rate was 42.7%. Twenty-four hours later, the normal cleavage rate of the normal fertilized oocytes was 79.6%. On the day of embryo transfer, the good-quality rate of embryos was 29.7% (22/74). A mean number of 3.4 (54/16) embryos were transferred to the patient during each cycle. Clinical pregnancy was found in 3 cases out of the 16 (18.8%).

CONCLUSIONThe applied value of rescue ICSI may be correlated with the number and maturity of oocytes on the retrieval day.

Female ; Fertilization ; Fertilization in Vitro ; Humans ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Pregnancy ; Sperm Injections, Intracytoplasmic

OBJECTIVETo separate high-quality sperm by PureSperm centrifugation applied to intrauterine insemination (IUI) cycles.

METHODSWe compared the separate results after washing the semen with one-layer and two-layer PureSperm gradient centrifugation methods and two-layer Percoll gradient centrifugation method, and used the recovered high-quality sperm for IUI.

RESULTSThe density of the sperm washed with one-layer PureSperm centrifugation method was significantly higher than that washed with two-layer Percoll and two-layer PureSperm centrifugation methods(P < 0.01), but there were no differences in all the results between the use of two-layer Percoll and two-layer PureSperm(P > 0.05). No significant differences in the motility, teratozoospermia and IUI results were found when the three methods were used for sperm preparation(P > 0.05). The percentage of morphologically normal sperm was markedly increased, and the non-sperm components such as leucocytes, epithelial cells and cellular fragments were significantly reduced after washed by the two methods.

CONCLUSIONPureSperm centrifugation is a safe, efficient and easy method for separating high-quality sperm on intrauterine insemination cycles.

Cell Separation ; methods ; Centrifugation, Density Gradient ; Female ; Humans ; Insemination, Artificial ; Male ; Spermatozoa ; cytology

Objective To evaluate the efficiency of the application of array comparative genomic hybridization (array-CGH) in preimplantation genetic diagnosis or screening (PGD/PGS), and compare the clinical outcomes of different stage embryo biopsy. Methods The outcomes of 381 PGD/PGS cycles referred in the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University from July 2011 to August 2015 were retrospectively analyzed. There were 320 PGD cycles with 156 cleavage-stage-biopsy cycles and 164 trophectoderm-biopsy cycles, 61 PGS cycles with 23 cleavage-stage-biopsy cycles and 38 trophectoderm-biopsy cycles.Chromosomal analysis was performed by array-CGH technology combined with whole genome amplification.Single embryo transfer was performed in all transfer cycles.Live birth rate was calculated as the main clinical outcomes. Results The embryo diagnosis rate of PGD/PGS by array-CGH were 96.9%-99.1%. In PGD biopsy cycles, the live birth rate per embryo transfer cycle and live birth rate per embryo biopsy cycle were 50.0%(58/116) and 37.2%(58/156) in cleavage-stage-biopsy group, 67.5%(85/126) and 51.8%(85/164) in trophectoderm-biopsy group (both P<0.01). In PGS biopsy cycles, the live birth rate per embryo transfer cycle and live birth rate per embryo biopsy cycle were the same as 34.8%(8/23) in cleavage-stage-biopsy group, the same as 42.1%(16/38) in trophectoderm-biopsy group (both P>0.05). Conclusions High diagnosis rate and idea live birth rate are achieved in PGD/PGS cycles based on array-CGH technology.The live birth rate of trophectoderm-biopsy group is significantly higher than that of cleavage-stage-biopsy group in PGD cycles;the efficiency of trophectoderm-biopsy is better.