Research question The aim was to evaluate the utility of single-sperm-based single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) haplotyping in preimplantation genetic testing (PGT) for male patients with genetic disorders in families with no identified haplotype and with Robertsonian translocations to avoid the transfer of embryos carrying translocated chromosomes. Design Single sperm were separated to identify genetically

Research question What's the effect of parental origin of translocation and predictors for obtaining an euploid embryo in pre-implantation genetic testing for chromosomal structural rearrangements (PGT-SR) for balanced translocation carriers? Design 179 PGT-SR cycles and 614 blastocysts from 123 couples carrying a balanced translocation were retrospectively analyzed. Next-generation sequencing (NGS)

Uterine fibroids are the most common cause of solid pelvic tumors, occurring in 20-30% of fertile women and presenting clinical complications that seriously impact women's health. They commonly cause severe symptoms such as heavy, prolonged menstrual bleeding and anaemia. The study of both microscopic and macroscopic vascular aspects of uterine fibroids is of crucial importance to understand the clinical

Research question Which of the two mainstream endometrial preparation regimens, assisted natural cycle (NC) and hormone replacement treatment cycle (HRT), can help frozen-thawed embryo transfer (FET) cycles after preimplantation genetic testing (PGT) achieve better clinical outcomes? Design This retrospective analysis included 3400 frozen-thawed single blastocyst transfer cycles after PGT from January

Research Question Is the blastocyst's idiosyncratic metabolic production of lactate, and subsequent creation of a specialized microenvironment at the implantation site an important mediator of maternal-fetal signaling to promote endometrial receptivity and implantation? Design Hormonally primed ECC-1 and Ishikawa cells were used to assess functional changes to the endometrial epithelium following exposure

Research Question: Is there an association between SARS-CoV-2 infection and first-trimester miscarriage? Design: Multicenter prospective study of a cohort of first-trimester miscarriages registered consecutively by seven Spanish hospitals, where universal PCR screening for SARS-CoV-2 infection was implemented for both, miscarriages and deliveries. The incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection among first-trimester

Elective single embryo transfer (eSET), first introduced to in vitro fertilization (IVF) in 1999, is one of the most consequential changes introduced. It can be viewed as the first (among many since) “add-ons” to IVF that has significantly and adversely affected how IVF is practiced, resulting in astonishing declines in live birth rates following fresh non-donor IVF cycles around the world. We offer

Research Question Do euploidy rates of embryos differs in four groups of women with low prognosis stratified by POSEIDON criteria? Design This was a retrospective cohort study of low-prognosis patients who met the POSEIDON criteria and underwent genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) from January 2013 to June 2020 in Center for Reproductive Medicine, Shandong University. 3, 016 blastocysts from 1,

Targeted cancer therapy is rapidly evolving the landscape of personalized health care. Novel approaches to selectively impeding tumor growth carry significant potential to improve survival outcomes, particularly for reproductive-aged patients harboring treatment refractory disease. Current agents fall within two classes, immunotherapy and small molecule inhibitors, which are collectively divided into

Research Question Is there any difference in the live birth rate between the natural cycle (NC) and hormone replacement therapy (HRT) endometrial preparation protocols for women with regular menstrual cycles undergoing their first single, frozen‒thawed euploid blastocyst transfer? Design This was a retrospective cohort study that enrolled 722 women who underwent frozen‒thawed euploid blastocyst transfer

Research Question What are the key drivers and barriers for infertile patients and their partners to see an infertility specialist Design An online, international, 30-minute quantitative survey collected data from 1,944 respondents from nine countries. Respondents were infertile patients (n=1,037) or partners to infertile patients (n=907; but not necessarily partners of the patient sample), at different

Research Question Does mild COVID-19 infection impact the ovarian reserve of women undergoing an Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) protocol? Design We conducted a prospective observational study between June and December 2020. We included women managed in our ART unit for fertility issues by in vitro fecundation / intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF/ICSI), fertility preservation (FP), frozen

Research question Are there any associations between dyslipidemia and pregnancy outcomes in the first complete cycle of in vitro fertilization/intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF/ICSI)? Design This was a long-term, retrospective real-world analysis involving 5030 infertile women who underwent first complete IVF/ICSI cycle from January 2015 to October 2020. Patients were categorized into the dyslipidemia

Research question Menstruation is a physiological event which is often associated with subjective distress. Is there a tool to assess and objectively evaluate the global distress experienced by women during their period? Design An observational cross-sectional study was conducted between June 2019 and May 2020 at Careggi University Hospital, Florence (Italy). A new questionnaire, the MEDI-Q, was developed

Research Question What are the reproductive choices and retrospective reflections of women at least four years after planned oocyte cryopreservation (POC)? Design An internet survey using REDCap application of women who had POC, in a single center university affiliated IVF unit, 4-8 year before survey. Questionnaire addressed reproductive choices and outcomes following POC. Results A total of 79 women

Research Question : To determine the reproductive potential of embryos that achieve blastulation on Day 7 (D7) followed by PGT-A for infertility patients that have slow embryo development. Design : Retrospective cohort study in a private IVF clinic of consecutive female infertility patients (n=2966) aged 24-48 (36.3±3.8) years who underwent frozen embryo transfer (FET) of a single euploid blastocyst

This article argues that that there are two important reasons why many potential donors refrain from donating and why many donors value not being outed as a sperm donor. The first reason is the stigma attached to sperm donation. The second is the attribution of fatherhood to the donor. Attributional fatherhood is based on the rejection of the basic rule underlying the practice of sperm donation, i

Research question What are the prognostic factors related to a high oocyte yield in fertility preservation (FP) for endometriosis-affected women? Design Observational cohort study in a tertiary care university hospital between April 2015 and January 2019. Included women underwent FP with ovarian stimulation (OS) for oocytes/embryo vitrification for endometriosis. The prognostic factors associated with

Research Question To evaluate the role of levonorgestrel-releasing intrauterine system (LNG-IUS) in the treatment of infertile women with endometrial hyperplasia without atypia (EH). Design Prospective cohort study including 215 infertile women with an indication to assisted reproductive treatments (ART) and a diagnosis of EH. EH was diagnosed by hysteroscopic endometrial biopsies. At the time of both

Research question Is there an association between endometrial thickness (EMT) on hCG trigger day and birthweight-related outcomes in fresh IVF/ICSI embryo transfer cycles? Design This is a retrospective cohort study of 9,273 singleton live births born to women undergoing fresh IVF/ICSI cycles in a single centre between January 2014 and December 2018. Multivariable logistic regression were used to investigate

To evaluate whether the administration of an oxytocin receptor antagonist around embryo transfer is associated with live birth and pregnancy achievement in IVF treatment a systematic literature review and meta-analysis was conducted. Multiple databases were searched for randomized controlled trials comparing the outcome of IVF treatment with administration of an oxytocin receptor antagonist before

Research question To evaluate the correlation between clinical and hormonal parameters and comorbidity burden in Caucasian women presenting for fertility treatment Design Monocentric cross-sectional study including a cohort of 3163 Caucasian women seeking medical care for fertility treatment. All the patients underwent centralized laboratory testing for hormonal assessment. Complete clinical and laboratory

Research question : Have women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) a different fat intake pattern? Design : A case-control study of 276 women between 20 and 35 years old from the Region of Murcia (Spain). Cases (n=121) were attended at Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics of the University Clinical Hospital and diagnosed with PCOS using Rotterdam criteria. Controls (n=155) were women without PCOS

Research question : Does the sex of reciprocal translocation carriers affect meiotic segregation patterns and stability of non-translocated chromosomes during meiosis? Design : A total of 790 couples who underwent preimplantation genetic testing for reciprocal translocations by using the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array platform from October 2016 to December 2019 were included. Among them

Research question : To study the impact of high serum anti-Mullerian hormone (AMH) levels on fertilization and embryo development among infertile women undergoing assisted reproductive technology (ART) treatment. Design : Retrospective study of 1036 infertile women undergoing ART were recruited. Women were divided into 3 groups according to serum AMH levels: AMH ≤1.1 ng/ml, 1.1-5.0 ng/ml, and >5.0

Research question : Is the concentration of hormones in follicular fluid (FF) and of their mRNA in cumulus granulosa cells (CC) different in naturally matured and stimulated follicles? Design : Cross-sectional study involving 57 Natural cycle IVF (NC-IVF) and 36 conventional gonadotropin stimulated IVF (cIVF) cycles run between 2014 and 2016. cIVF was performed by controlled ovarian stimulation with

The goal of an in vitro fertilisation (IVF) cycle is the birth of at least one baby per treatment intention. However, IVF cannot confer competence to an embryo, but only provides each couple with a safe treatment to meet a predetermined chance of success. In this commentary, we highlight how clinical, financial, and patient-centred perspectives should be included in the definition of success in IVF

Research question The relation between endometriosis and sleep disturbances has been poorly investigated. This study aimed at exploring the association between endometriosis, pelvic pain symptoms, fatigue, and sleep. Psychological health and quality of life (QoL) in endometriosis patients with good vs. bad quality of sleep were also examined. Design In this matched pair case-control study, we included

Research Question Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), has a prominent role in pregnancy and thus, impact pregnancy outcome. The study aimed to investigate an association of VEGF gene 1154G>A, 634G>C and 583C>T polymorphic variations between cases of recurrent pregnancy loss (RPL) and full-term fertile women with successful pregnancies. Design The study included 200 women with RPL and 240 women

The main goal of ART has been the achievement of a healthy singleton live birth following the replacement of one embryo. One of the major ambition of IVF scientists has been always to utilize an adequate criteria to select the embryo to transfer according to its implantation potential. Indeed, visual morphology evaluation is usually applied to assess embryo quality, which relies on the removal of the

Research question: Therapies for Hodgkin Lymphoma (HL) have improved in the last few years but one of their common effects is gonadal toxicity that contributes to fertility damage of patients inducing temporary or irreversible loss of fertility. Could miRNA expression profiles in Follicular Fluid (FF) be influenced by HL? Could their alteration have an impact on molecular pathways involved in follicle

The preservation of fertility in women of childbearing age with breast cancer is challenging since the time for ovarian stimulation is restricted and only a limited amount of oocytes can be retrieved before gonadotoxic therapies. The aim of this meta-analysis is to evaluate the fertility preservation outcomes after ovarian stimulation with various protocols in women with breast cancer. PubMed, Embase

Research question : Does maternal preconception insulin resistance (IR) affect neonatal birth weight (BW) among women with obesity? Is IR associated with circulating bile acids (BA) and do BA influence the association of maternal preconception IR with neonatal BW? Design : This was an exploratory post-hoc analysis of the LIFEstyle RCT comparing lifestyle intervention versus conventional infertility

RESEARCH QUESTION: Female age is the single greatest factor influencing reproductive performance and granulosa cells are considered as potential biomarkers of oocyte quality. Is there an age-effect on the energy metabolism of human mural granulosa cells? DESIGN: Observational prospective cohort and experimental study including 127 women that underwent in vitro fertilization cycles. Women were allocated

Research Question : Endometriosis is a common benign disease, associated with pain, infertility and reduced quality of life. In addition, endometriosis is a known risk factor for various cancers. However, robust biomarkers for early detection and prediction of prognosis are still missing. Circulating cell-free DNA (ccfDNA) is an easy to obtain biomarker associated with prognosis of cancer patients

Research Question To examine the relationship between unexplained recurrent pregnancy loss (RPL) and the risk for cancer morbidity. Design We conducted a retrospective observational cohort study, based on data from a tertiary medical center. RPL cases (exposed) were defined as women presenting with 3 or more unexplained confirmed pregnancy losses at 5 -24 weeks, whose first visit to the RPL clinic

Research question: Is the growth of term singletons born after frozen embryo transfer (FET) comparable to those born after fresh embryo transfer (fresh ET) and natural conception (NC) up to five years of age? Design: Observational cohort study in a setting of an academic medical center and municipal child health clinics with repeated measurements carried out by medical professionals. Term singletons

Research Question What is the impact of a clinical pregnancy on the composition of the urinary microbiota? Design 85 women receiving an in-vitro fertilization (IVF), with or without intracytoplasmic sperm injection (IVF-ICSI) treatment were included in a prospective observational study performed in 2008. Approximately 14 weeks prior to the start of hormonal treatment and embryo transfer (ET), a midstream

Research question Is late-follicular phase progesterone elevation (PE) associated with a deleterious effect on embryo euploidy, blastocyst formation rate and cumulative live birth rates (CLBRs)? Design We performed a multicenter retrospective cross-sectional study including infertile patients aged 18-40 years who underwent ovarian stimulation in a GnRH antagonist protocol and preimplantation genetic

Research Question How to evaluate the effect of genetic mutations that may cause primary female infertility? Design Patients and their family members were subject to whole-exome sequencing and Sanger sequencing to detect the infertility-causing gene and inheritance pattern. To study the function of mutant proteins in vitro, vectors containing wild-type or mutant TUBB8 cDNA were constructed for transient

Research question What are the effects of the early phase of COVID-19 pandemic on natural and ART-mediated birth rates? Design Upon permission by Health Authorities of Lombardy Region, Northern Italy, an area that was particularly affected by the epidemic in the early phase, regional registries were consulted. Deliveries occurred in the area between January 1st, 2019 and December 31st, 2020 from women

Research Question Does blastocyst biopsy for preimplantation genetic testing (PGT) increase the risk of adverse maternal and neonatal outcomes? Study design A retrospective cohort study was conducted. A total of 5097 single frozen-thawed blastocyst transfer cycles, including 2061 cycles in the biopsied group and 3036 cycles in the unbiopsied group, from January 2016 to December 2018 were enrolled in

Biovigilance is the systematic monitoring of serious adverse reactions and events (SARE) that ensures the quality and safety of tissues and cells for human application in medically assisted reproduction (MAR). The Notify Library is an open access database launched by the World Health Organization (WHO) and supported by the Italian National Transplant Centre (CNT) that has collected information on documented

Research question What role does wild-type p53-induced phosphatase 1 (WIP1) play in the regulation of primordial follicle development? Design WIP1 expression was detected in the ovaries of mice of different ages by western blotting and immunohistochemical staining. Three-day-old neonatal mouse ovaries were cultured in vitro with or without the WIP1 inhibitor GSK2830371 (10 μM) for 4 days. Ovarian morphology

Research question Can the low-temperature transport time of removed human ovarian tissue be prolonged until cryopreservation? Design Fresh ovarian cortex from nine premenopausal patients was either slow-frozen immediately or stored at 4°C for 24 or 48 h before slow-freezing. The fresh and frozen–thawed biopsies were evaluated by follicle counting via calcein staining, histologic analyses via haematoxylin

Research question During the embryo transfer procedure, to what degree of temperature drop are embryos exposed to between loading the transfer catheter and placing it into the uterus? Design Twenty-nine simulated embryo transfer procedures were carried out across five clinics. A thermocouple probe was used for standardized measurements inside the embryo transfer catheter to investigate the change in

Research question What are the hormonal and ovarian histological effects of a gender affirming hormonal therapy in assigned female at birth (AFAB) transgender people? Design Prospective observational study of 70 AFAB transgender people taking testosterone therapy before gender-affirming surgery (hystero-oophorectomy). A gynaecological ultrasonographic scan was undertaken and serum hormone concentrations

Research question What is the effect of weight loss through different interventions (three-component lifestyle intervention with short message service [SMS+] versus three-component lifestyle intervention without SMS [SMS–] versus care as usual [CAU]) on polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) characteristics (ovulatory dysfunction, hyperandrogenism, polycystic ovarian morphology [PCOM]) and phenotype distribution

Research Question: Recombinant FSH administration in controlled ovarian stimulation for in vitro fertilization (IVF) is a standard procedure, while the role of LH is controversial. MicroRNAs participate in the regulation of gene expression of gonadotrophin functions. We aimed to study the possible role of miRNAs in ovarian follicular development in groups having different ovarian stimulation protocols

Research Question: What is the mechanism of hypermethylation of RUNX3 in the eutopic endometrium of endometriosis as biomarker in the malignant transformation of endometriosis. Design: MSP was used to analyze the methylation status of RUNX3 in endometriosis-associated ovarian cancer (EAOC). Primary eutopic endometrial stromal cells (ESCs) were isolated from the uteri of patients with ovarian endometriosis

Research question To determine whether cumulative live birth rates (CLBRs) after follitropin alfa (Ovaleap®) and follitropin beta (Puregon®) are similar when used for ovarian stimulation with ICSI (Intracytoplasmic sperm injection) in a first rank GnRH antagonist protocol. Design Retrospective single centre cohort study including 832 infertile patients undergoing ovarian stimulation with a daily dose

Research question This online explorative observational study aimed to obtain insight into the current diet of women with endometriosis, in terms of adherence to dietary guidelines, use of diets, and perceived effects of dietary modifications. Design Diet quality was assessed with the Dutch Healthy Diet 2015 index (DHD-15) and quality of life (QoL) with the Endometriosis Health Profile-30 questionnaire

Research question Male infertility is one of the important symptoms in patients with primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD). PCD-related male infertility is often caused by asthenozoospermia with barely normal sperm morphology. Multiple morphological abnormalities of the sperm flagella (MMAF) is a major cause of asthenozoospermia characterized by various malformed morphologies of sperm flagella. To date