État de santé somatique des enfants conçus après assistance médicale à la procréation : un panorama d'ensemble.

Since the birth of the first baby conceived by In Vitro Fertilization, there has been a rapid and constant increase in the number of couples using assisted reproductive technologies (ART). Around 7 million of children have been born from couples experiencing fertility problems, through the use of ART, comprising roughly 2-6% of all births in Europe and U.S. That highlights that these modes of fertilization are now well assumed by our societies. However, several questions on health of these children remain to be elucidated. As evoked in this review, even if methodological limitations exist, numerous studies have reported increased risks of birth defects, like prematurity, foetal hypotrophy, neonatal complications, congenital malformations such as cardiovascular and epigenetic diseases among ART-conceived children as compared to naturally conceived children. Nowadays, it is difficult to determine if these increased risks found in ART infants are a consequence of the ART procedures or are inherent to the infertility problems per se. However, absolute risks remain moderate and reassuring and the prevalence of these pathologies is low. After adjusting for the confounding factors, the data are reassuring with a psychomotor development and cognition equivalent to those of children conceived naturally. In addition, the occurrence of chronic diseases in adulthood as well as cancer (e.g. hematological and neurological) could be increased which still requires all our vigilance and long-term follow-up studies of these children. These investigations are necessary to decipher the pathophysiological processes involved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]