by Corey Whelan
Just in time for summer, a new report links a widely-used and highly-effective sunscreen ingredient to an increased risk for women of being diagnosed with endometriosis, a leading cause of infertility. The ingredient, …
Month: May 2012
Progestin may reduce pregnancy chances
May 28 (UPI)
Progestin, a hormone used to treat infertility due to polycystic ovary syndrome, may reduce the odds of conception and giving birth, U.S. researchers say.
Dr. Michael P. Diamond of Wayne State University in Detroit, Dr. Richard S. Legro of the Pennsylvania State College of Medicine in Hershey and researchers at 16 institutions in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Cooperative Reproductive Medicine Network said polycystic ovary syndrome is a disorder in which the ovaries, and sometimes the adrenal glands, produce excess amounts of hormones.
Women with the disorder typically have menstrual irregularities and may have difficulty getting pregnant.
Infertility treatment for the condition typically involves ovulation induction — drug treatment to stimulate the release of an egg, but before ovulation induction, physicians often use a single course of progestin, which leads to a thickening in the lining of the uterus.
The idea behind the treatment is to simulate the bleeding that occurs at the beginning of the monthly menstrual cycle, Diamond explained.
However, women who skipped the progestin before receiving fertility drugs were four times more likely to conceive than were women given the hormone.
In addition, 20 percent of the women who did not receive progestin gave birth, compared with about 5 percent of the women who received progestin.
Contraception Rule is Legal
Contrary to the claims of Professor Marc DeGirolami (“Dem-backed law could be downfall of Obama’s birth-control mandate,” May 22), the requirement that insurance plans cover contraception without copays or deductibles is perfectly legal under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).
New Study Sounds Warning on Hormone Replacement Therapy
Women who are past menopause and healthy should not take hormone replacement therapy in hopes of warding off dementia, bone fractures or heart disease, according to a new analysis by the government task force that weighs the risks and benefits of screening and other therapies aimed at preventing illness.
Long-term contraception more effective than pills
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – A large real-life test of several types of contraception found more women got pregnant while using short-acting methods such as pills, patches and vaginal rings — and the failure rate was highest when they were used by women under 21.
“We found that participants using oral contraceptive pills, a transdermal patch or a vaginal ring had a risk of contraceptive failure that was 20 times as high as the risk among those using long-acting reversible contraception,” said the research team, led by Dr. Brooke Winner of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.
Eat for two — even before there are two
There’s so much about trying to conceive that’s out of our control, so it always seems like truly good news to hear about something we can do that may make getting pregnant (and retaining a healthy pregnancy) a little more likely. That’s why our ears pricked up at new research out of the Netherlands: A new study appearing in the medical journal Human Reproduction looked at the diets of Dutch couples who were planning to get pregnant, and then specifically at 199 couples who’d undergone their first cycle of in vitro fertilization (IVF) or intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI).
Since we’re already told you this is a story with good news, you might guess what the researchers found: The healthier a woman’s diet before she got pregnant, the better her odds were of an ongoing pregnancy following fertility treatment.
Dutch dietary guidelines (what is defined there as a healthy diet) don’t vary a lot from what the U.S. government considers healthy (see ChooseMyPlate.gov for more on that), so this is good news for American women as well, since what we eat is one thing we can do something about, in a host of things we can’t influence. Says John Twigt, one of the study authors, from the department of obstetrics and gynaecology, Erasmus MC, University Medical Centre Rotterdam, in the Netherlands: “We would like to emphasize the fact that the preconception period is the window of opportunity to optimize the diet in couples planning pregnancy.”
What do you eat? Has your diet changed now that you’re TTC? What have you given up, and what foods have you added?
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Call for State Funding of IVF in Ireland
Fertility experts have called for the provision of State funding for in vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatment.
“The realisation that financial and societal savings could result from the introduction of a State-funded IVF programme with compulsory elective single embryo transfers (eSET) where recommended should come sooner rather than later,” they concluded.
Their research makes available for the first time cumulative data from six of the seven IVF clinics in the country providing a reference on assisted reproductive treatment (ART) and outcomes for practicing doctors in Ireland.
Researchers from various fertility centres in Ireland presented, in the latest edition of the Irish Medical Journal, national data on ART treatment over 10 years voluntarily reported by six out of seven IVF clinics.
Online Tool Helps Track Menopause Symptoms
A full 72 percent of women experiencing menopausal symptoms have not received treatment for them, according to a new survey by the Endocrine Society. The poll, conducted in mid-April, also found that 60 percent of women exhibiting symptoms of menopause have not talked to their primary health providers about possible treatment.
The statistics prompted the Endocrine Society and its Hormone Health Network to develop a so-called Menopause Map — an interactive online quiz that helps women and their doctors discuss what treatment options (hormonal or nonhormonal) might be the most effective for them.
Menopausal women who are about to or have already stopped menstruating may also experience hot flashes, sweating, insomnia, mood swings, fatigue, depression and vaginal dryness, among others. Although the tool does not encourage women to pursue one avenue of treatment over another, it prompts women to consider a range of options to alleviate menopausal symptoms, including hormone therapy.
Mini-IVF Yields Mini Success
by Corey Whelan
If your reproductive endocrinologist offered you the option of doing a less expensive form of In Vitro Fertilization, which not only required less injected medication but also had the same success rate as the more expensive …
IVF Treatment and Overall Rate of Breast Cancer…
In a large population-based study out of Western Australia, researchers have found that IVF is not associated with an overall increased risk of breast cancer. However, the analysis of 20 years’ worth of linked hospital and registry records demonstrates an underlying, age-related connection between IVF treatment and breast cancer. The effect of IVF on breast cancer rates differed depending on the age of the women at the time treatment was commenced. In younger, but not older, patients there was an association between having IVF and an increased risk of breast cancer.