BACKGROUND Case reports have reported venous and arterial thromboses in women undergoing assisted reproduction. No large systematic studies on the risk of thrombosis have been published. The objective of our study was to investigate whether the risk of thrombosis is increased in women undergoing assisted reproduction. METHODS A national register-based cohort study was conducted on all women u...

Assisted reproductive techniques (ART) have now been extensively incorporated in the management of infertile couples. But even after rapid methodological and technological advances the success rates of these procedures have been below expectations. This has led to development of many sperm preparation protocols to obtain an ideal semen sample for artificial reproduction. Sperm apoptosis has bee...

BACKGROUND Progesterone prepares the endometrium for pregnancy by stimulating proliferation in response to human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), which is produced by the corpus luteum. This occurs in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle. In assisted reproduction techniques (ART) the progesterone or hCG levels, or both, are low and the natural process is insufficient, so the luteal phase is sup...

This article describes a technique for anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) repair using a synthetic braided ligament made of 75% degradable polyglycolic acid filaments and 25% nondegradable, 6.5-mm Dacron thread, wrapped in a free synovial graft. In a prospective study of 70 consecutive patients, this technique (experimental group) was compared to a standard bone-patellar tendon-bone autograft tec...

The advent of human in vitro fertilization (IVF) over 30 years ago has made the oocyte and preimplantation embryo uniquely accessible. This accessibility has given rise to new micromanipulation techniques, such as intracytoplasmic sperm injection for treatment of male infertility, as well as embryo biopsy for preimplantation diagnosis of both genetic disease and aneuploidy, a major cause of ear...

Assisted reproduction techniques (ART), in particular in-vitro fertilization and intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection, are the most advanced forms of infertility treatment. They involve numerous counseling, medical, surgical and laboratory-based steps. At each step various problems and complications could be encountered that challenge even the most experienced ART practitioners. Moreover, patients...

Teams practising medically assisted reproduction techniques try to avoid viruses as much as possible. Attitudes towards chronic carriers of viruses are rapidly changing, especially for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) patients. We focus our attention on the legitimacy of systematic screening before assisted reproductive techniques and the need for specialized approaches including an adapted l...

A November 2000 workshop organized by the International Islamic Center for Population Studies and Research, Al-Azhar University, Cairo, considered use of assisted reproduction technologies (ART) in the Islamic world. The workshop reinforced a 1997 recommendation that a Standing Committee for Shari'a Medical Ethics be constituted to monitor and assess developments in ART practice. Among issues t...

Assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) have spread at a surprising speed in Iran, since their introduction three decades ago. Currently over 75 clinics offer fertility treatment, in all its forms, throughout the country. The practice of ARTs in Iran, which is an Islamic state, was made possible, initially, through the endorsement of leading religious authorities. While the use of these biote...