ICSI

Yesterday we learned that our embryologist (well call him Ebro from now on) has just returned from an embryology conference in Spain, and upon reviewing our case, recommended that we do ICSI.

ICSI is a process by which they do an egg retrieval as usual, take all the eggs and remove a fluid that surrounds them so that they can see the actual cell up-close and personal. This gives them the ability to see the VERY BEST eggs to fertilize.

Then, they take a look at the sperm. They search for the VERY BEST looking, acting, swimming sperm and choose those to fertilize the eggs with.

The egg is suctioned to a tiny holder, called a pipette. The sperm - wham! - has it's tail cut off, and is sucked up into a microscopic needle. The needle is inserted into the nucleus of the egg, the sperm is injected, and the needle is removed. The two introduce themselves, and hopefully decide to fertilize. If all is healthy, the egg divides naturally from there.

This process, of course, comes with a few added risks - one being that you don't know for sure what sperm you're injecting - you hope it is healthy and normal, but it isn't 100%. The egg naturally has some safeguards against abnormal sperm fertilizing it and ICSI bypasses all those safeguards. Second, because ICSI punctures the "shell" of the egg, the chances for the entire egg to separate and cause identical twins, triplets, etc increases by about 5-10%. This is rare, but it does happen. So when you're talking three embryos, that's a possibility of a lot of babies.

I can't figure out how to post a video yet, but if you want to see the process, click here:

Embro hasn't recommended this lightly; but feels that for us to get the best chance at having embies to transfer at all that this is the way we should go. The way we're looking at it is heck - for this thing to work it will take a series of miracles anyway, what is one more step for God?