Fertility Dictionary

Fertility treatment can involve an awful lot of abbreviations and jargon. We attempt to clear some of the fog surrounding this subject matter with this short dictionary,

• Assisted Hatching: perforating the Zona Pellucida, or shell of the egg to help the very early embryo (the blastocyst) escape
• ART: Assisted Reproduction Technique e.g. IVF
• Blastocyst: very early embryo
• Cryopreservation: frozen storage of sperm, eggs, embryos or other reproductive tissue for later use.
• DI: donor insemination.
• FER: frozen embryo replacement also known as FET - frozen embryo transfer
• GIFT: gamete intra-fallopian transfer. The process by which eggs are collected after ovarian stimulation by laparoscopy or vaginal ultrasound-directed aspiration and mixed with prepared sperm. These are then introduced in the Fallopian tube either through a laparoscope or transvaginally.
• ICSI: intracytoplasmic sperm injection: process by which an egg is fertilised by injecting a single sperm into the egg.
• IUI: inter-uterine insemination: sperm are washed and then placed directly into the uterus
• IVF: in vitro fertilisation: fertilisation of an egg by sperm in a laboratory dish.
• PGD: pre-implantation genetic diagnosis: diagnostic technique involving genetic tests on an embryo. Generally done when the embryo is at the six to eight cell stage when one cell is removed for analysis of its DNA to determine whether or not the embryo is likely to develop a genetic disease.
• PGS: pre-implantation genetic screening: using genetic techniques to check if an embryo has the right number of chromosomes. Used particularly for older women (at increased risk of chromosomal abnormalities) and for women who have had recurrent miscarriages (often due to chromosomal abnormalities).