A pilot study by researchers from King’s College London, King’s College Hospital and King’s Fertility shows that genetic testing on IVF embryos can help women over the age of 35 get pregnant faster. The study, published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine , is the first randomized controlled trial in the world to focus exclusively on women aged 35 to 42, a group at increased risk of chromosomal abnormalities in embryos.

The study investigated the effect of Preimplantation Genetic Testing for Aneuploidy (PGT-A), a test to check for chromosomal abnormalities before embryo transfer. Older women are more likely to produce embryos with the wrong number of chromosomes, which makes it difficult to conceive and increases the risk of miscarriage. Current guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) do not routinely recommend PGT-A, as previous studies have mainly looked at younger women with a lower risk of aneuploidy. What is new about the study is the inclusion of mosaic embryos, which contain both normal and abnormal cells and have rarely been considered in IVF research.

The open-label pilot study of 100 women was conducted at King’s Fertility from June 2021 to June 2023. The participants were divided into two groups: 50 received PGT-A tests, 50 formed the control group without genetic tests. The PGT-A group showed a higher cumulative live birth rate after up to three embryo transfers (72% vs. 52% in the control group) and required fewer transfers to achieve pregnancy. Although the results were not statistically significant due to the small sample size, they suggest a potential benefit of PGT-A.

The study emphasizes that PGT-A could shorten the time to conception and reduce the emotional burden of repeated IVF cycles. The researchers call for larger multicenter studies to confirm the findings, highlighting the potential of PGT-A to improve treatment efficiency for women of advanced reproductive age.

Original Paper:

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12295310

Editor: X-Press Journalistenbüro GbR

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