Should intrauterine human chorionic gonadotropin infusions ever be used prior to embryo transfer?

What Was Tested

This controlled clinical trial paper looks at hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin).

The aim of this study was to explore the factors that influence the outcome of intrauterine human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) infusion at the time of embryo transfer (ET), in particular, the effect of hCG infusions on fresh and frozen embryo transfers (FETs) and whether prior recurrent implantation failure (RIF) impacts upon outcomes.

Who Took Part

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults and middle-aged adults, women only.

The analysis contains 458 cases and 749 matched controls, with an intervention group of those given intrauterine hCG prior to ET and a control group of patients receiving no hCG infusion.

The second analysis divided patients into those with RIF (cases n = 149, controls n = 200) and those without (cases n = 309, controls n = 549).

How the Study Was Run

This was a case-control study based on a standardized database from a multi-site in vitro fertilization clinic.

Outcomes were defined as clinical pregnancy and live birth rates.

The first separated FETs (cases n = 224, controls n = 325) and fresh ETs (cases n = 234, controls n = 424), with outcomes calculated in each group.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Birth Rate, Case-Control Studies, Chorionic Gonadotropin, Cryopreservation, Drug Administration Routes, Embryo Implantation and Embryo Transfer.

Author keywords: Human chorionic gonadotropin, IVF and Intrauterine.

What This Means in Plain Language

This is a controlled clinical trial of hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin).

Its findings take up roughly 4 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2018 (Journal of assisted reproduction and genetics), a journal based in Netherlands.

More context: the hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin) compound page, all human trials.