The results of a retrospective cohort study by scholars from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Emory University, published in the prestigious American medical journal JAMA on January 20, 2015, suggest that the use of ICSI (intracytoplasmic single sperm injection) as an assisted reproductive technology for male infertility in the United States doubled between 1996 and 2012 (36.4 percent to 76.2 percent); however, their findings also led them to wonder: does this technique improve fertility outcomes with assisted reproductive technologies compared to traditional IVF (in vitro fertilization)? Unlike traditional IVF, which unites a number of sperm with a mature egg in a laboratory dish, ICSI requires the injection of a single sperm into a mature egg and the transfer of the fertilized egg or embryo into the woman’s uterus. ICSI was invented in 1992 and revolutionized the treatment of male factor infertility (abnormal semen characteristics, abnormal sperm function, or surgical sterilization), allowing a large percentage of men with undetectable sperm to achieve their fertility dreams. dream. Unlike traditional IVF, ICSI bypasses the barrier of natural fertilization and therefore greatly increases the risk of passing on genetic defects to offspring. For example, researchers note that “the risk of chromosomal abnormalities, imprinting abnormalities, autism, intellectual disability and congenital malformations is increased 1.5 to 4 times after pregnancy through an ICSI cycle compared to traditional IVF.” In addition, the ICSI process is also much more expensive than traditional IVF, increasing the financial burden on participants. The study’s principal investigator, Sheree L. Boulet, PhD, a scholar at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, examined trends in the use of fresh IVF treatments (fertilized eggs transferred directly into the uterus without first being frozen) and their fertility outcomes throughout the United States, based on a comparison of ICSI with traditional IVF, along with her colleagues. The study was based on data on IVF and ICSI treatments collected by the National Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) Surveillance System between 1996 and 2012, with 13,95634 cases of fresh IVF treatment included in the study. Overall, between 1996 and 2012, ICSI use in the United States increased from 36.4% to 76.2%, more than doubling. more than doubled. In the treatment of male-factor infertility, ICSI use increased from 76.3% in 1996 to 93.3% in 2012, while in the treatment of non-male-factor infertility, ICSI use increased from 15.4% in 1996 to 66.9% in 2012. For the most recent period, the number of people treated with fresh ICSI for male-factor infertility between 2008 and 2012 was 494907 (35.7%). Analysis of the data found that for male-factor infertility, fertility outcomes with fresh ICSI treatment were similar to those with conventional IVF treatment. However, in the absence of male-factor infertility, fresh ICSI sessions resulted in “small but significant” reductions in the incidence of fertility, pregnancy, live births and multiple live births compared to conventional IVF. Thus, the researchers noted, “The results of this study confirm a steady increase in the rate of ART treatment, including ICSI, in the United States from 1996 to 2012. In contrast to conventional IVF, ICSI was not associated with improved fertility outcomes in ART without male factor infertility. It is possible that this irrelevance is due to data from a large sample and may not be clinically meaningful, but our study can still suggest that in cases of unexplained infertility, advanced fertility and low egg counts, ICSI use may improve fertilization rates, but not fertilization or pregnancy rates.” The research team also acknowledged some flaws in their results. For example, the National Assisted Reproductive Technology Surveillance System (NASS) does not collect data on fertilization rates or on comparative data between ICSI outcomes and IVF outcomes with frozen eggs. With regard to ART, two other recent studies have shown that ART has a lower risk of maternal complications, but ART increases the risk of serious birth complications such as: stillbirth, preterm birth, low birth weight babies and neonatal death. in December, a study published in the prestigious journal Cell, researchers from the University of Cambridge, UK and the Weizmann Institute, Israel, reported in detail on the use of In a study published in December in the prestigious journal Cell, researchers from the University of Cambridge and the Weizmann Institute in Israel detailed the successful use of human embryonic stem cells and adult skin cells to generate protoplast cells (precursor cells for eggs and sperm). Although this has already been reported using rodent stem cells, this is the first time that human stem cells have been successfully used. It is not known if similar research could open another door to infertility treatment.