Stem cell science continues to offer great promise. But a growing number of clinics are selling treatments without evidence that what they offer is effective – or even safe.
Women have been getting their fallopian tubes flushed for 100 years to help them conceive. Studies show it works, all the better if you use an oil-based liquid.
South Africa lacks a clear definition of disability – and its limited view of who should be regarded as having a disability in the labour market is at odds with international practice.
Our recent audit of success rates provided on the websites of IVF clinics’ in Australia and New Zealand identified some common traps in the way these figures are presented.
In pregnancy, immune cells help the uterus tolerate and nurture the embryo despite it carrying foreign genes from the father. In most women, suppressing immunity will likely cause more harm than good.
You would need to drink over a thousand bottles of red wine per day to get the amount of resveratrol - the compound said to have many health benefits - needed to even have an effect.
One in ten cancer patients will face fertility issues after treatment, but less than 50% are given options to preserve fertility. And those who are offered options can face significant cost barriers.
Early studies suggest a process called advanced in-vitro maturation may be able to treat infertility without women needing to inject themselves with high doses of hormones for several weeks.
Pelvic inflammatory disease’s traumatic consequences are unmatched by the low level of awareness around it. Left untreated, it can cause chronic pelvic pain, ectopic pregnancy and infertility.
The practice of offering egg freezing perks to employees is becoming increasingly more common. Facebook and Apple are in on the act, as too are some of our local IVF clinics.
Thanks to IVF and donor conception, infertile couples, single women and lesbian couples now have a better chance of starting families. But while common, it’s rarely openly discussed.
Clinics aren’t compelled to disclose their success rates, so it’s impossible to compare all clinics. Even when they do, the pretty graphs on clinic websites can be difficult to understand.
Freezing young men’s sperm might remove worries about them fathering children in later life, but do we really want the state routinely meddling in conception?
Professor - Emerging Technologies (Stem Cells) at The University of Melbourne and Group Leader - Stem Cell Ethics & Policy at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, The University of Melbourne