Search

Introduction: To review the outcome of oocyte donation cases at TMC Fertility Centre for the year 2007. Materials/Methods: This is a retrospective analysis of all oocyte donation treatment cycles in the TMC Fertility Centre for 2007. Oocyte donors were assessed according to ASRM guidelines. Oocyte donation was performed for sub-fertile women with low ovarian reserve. The oocyte donors were either known or anonymous (ratio 1:26). Oocyte recipients, except non-cycling women were down-regulated to synchronize with the donor and subsequently received both oestrogen and progesterone for endometrial development. The oocytes collected then underwent IVF or ICSI. Results: A total of 82 oocyte retrievals were done. Of these, 70 cases progressed to embryo transfer. The mean age of oocyte donors was 25.3 (ranging from 18-45 years old) and for the recipients was 41.1 (ranging from 23-53 years old). A total of 181 embryos were transferred, resulting in 69 pregnancy sacs. The mean number of embryos transferred was 2.6 and the implantation rate was 38.1%. There were 45 clinical pregnancies, giving a clinical pregnancy rate per embryo transfer of 64.3%. The ongoing/delivery rate per embryo transfer was 54.3%. Of the 38 ongoing or delivered pregnancies, 23 are singleton (60.5%), 13 sets are twins (34.2%) and two sets are triplets (5.3%). Conclusions: Oocyte donation offers an effective treatment option for sub-fertile women with low ovarian reserve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Female fecundity is known to decline with age. Declining oocyte quality and quantity is known to be a major contributor. Uterine factors are also thought to contribute to the causes of female infertility. The question arises as to whether the ageing uterus of older women contributes to declining fertility. The objective of the study is to compare the clinical pregnancy, delivery and implantation rate per embryo transfer in patients with young uterine age using their own oocytes and patients with advance uterine age using donor oocytes. Materials/Methods: A retrospective analysis was undertaken of 21 donor cycles (group A) and 42 own-oocyte cycles (group B) done at the TMC Fertility Centre (formerly the Damansara Fertility Centre) in the year 2006. The criteria for patient selection were normal uterus with regular trilaminar endometrium pattern and endometrium thickness of 7 mm or more. Patients with an abnormal uterus such as bicornuate, submucous fibroids and polyps were excluded from the data. These criteria were determined from ultrasound scanning. Results: The mean age of the oocytes in group A was 26.3 and in group B was 27.3. There was no significant difference between the mean age of the two groups (P > 0.05). The age range for donors in group A and patients in group B was 23 to 29 years old. The age range for recipients in group A was 37 to 49 years old, with a mean of 43.2. The clinical pregnancy rate (PR), delivery rate (DR) and implantation rate (IR) for group A and group B were 73.7%, 63.2% and 47.3% and 52.6%, 44.7% and 34.1%, respectively. The PR, DR and IR appear higher in the older patients but none of the comparisons was statistically significant (P = 0.106, P = 0.151 and P = 0.08 respectively). Conclusions: Based on the results obtained, despite a more advanced recipients' age, the clinical pregnancy, delivery and implantation rates were as good if not better compared with women using their own oocytes. This study shows that pregnancy outcome is not compromised by the age of the uterus, provided the uterus appears normal on ultrasound assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Large volume of peripheral blood collection has been shown to result in higher haematopoietic stem cells counts than normal volume peripheral blood collection. The objective of this study is to evaluate the influence of cord blood volume on the number of harvested nucleated cells by the usage of an automated processing technology (AXPTM AutoXpress™ Platform) in Asian patients. StemTech International is the first private cord blood bank in Malaysia to utilize this automated processing technology for automatically processing cord blood stem cells before cryopreservation. Materials/Methods: Cord blood of varying volume were collected from 40 healthy donors. Cord blood was collected by aseptic techniques using a purpose-designed cord blood collection bag. Upon collection, the cord blood was delivered to our laboratory within 24 h. Total nucleated cells (TNC) were isolated by the automated processing technology at our Class 100 Cleanroom and counted on an automated haematology cell counter. The correlation between cord blood volume and the number of TNC harvested by the automated processing technology were then evaluated. Results: The volume of cord blood collected in our Asian patients varies between 35.6 and 140.9 ml. TNC count obtained varied between 2.92--18.81 x 108 cells. There is a strong correlation between the TNC count and the volume of cord blood collected, r = 0.792 (40), two-tailed P < 0.05. With rsup2; = 0.627, 62.7% of the variation between TNC count is accounted for by the cord blood volume collected. Conclusion: There is a strong correlation between cord blood volume and TNC count in Asian patients using the AXP automated processing technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: StemTech International uses an automated processing technology (AXP™) for cord blood processing to isolate and capture stem cells from umbilical cord blood in a closed system. This automated processing system claims to give a total nucleated cell (TNC) recovery of about 90% or more. In another Malaysian set-up, the manual processing method has been reported to obtain a TNC recovery rate of only 66.7%. We describe our experience as the first private cord blood stem cell bank to utilize this automated processing technology in Malaysia. We also compare the TNC recovery from cord blood collected from patients pregnant through assisted reproductive technology compared with those collected from spontaneously conceived pregnancies. Materials/Methods: Umbilical cord blood was collected by aseptic techniques using a purpose-designed cord blood collection bag from the most recent 20 consecutive patients conceived through assisted reproductive technology (group A) and the most recent 20 consecutive patient conceived spontaneously (group B). The cord blood was delivered to our laboratory within 24 h. In our Class 100 Cleanroom, nucleated cells were separated by an automated processing technology (AXP™ AutoXpress™ Platform) with the use of Hetastarch (HES) and counted on an automatic haematology cell counter. Results: The mean TNC recovery of the 40 patients studied was 86.80 ± 6.03%, which was 29.8% higher than what was achieved by manual processing as documented by another cord blood bank in the Malaysian setting (referred to above). In group A, the mean volume of cord blood collected was 77.6 ± 32.7 ml with a TNC count of 7.70 ± 4.06 x 108 cells. 87.21 ± 6.40% of TNC were recovered. In group B, the mean volume of cord blood collected was 54.50 ± 17.62 ml with a TNC count of 5.79 ± 2.53 x 108 cells. 86.39 ± 5.77% of TNC were recovered. There was no significant difference in the percentage of TNC recovery between the two groups (P = 0.718). Conclusion: Our results show that the automated processing technology used by StemTech International obtains a higher TNC recovery rate compared with manual processing methods. Higher stem cells harvested means higher successful outcome in transplantation. Our automated cell recovery processing achieves similar TNC recovery from both assisted reproductive technology and spontaneously conceived babies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]