Fertility: stop all the clocks

As an increasing number of women delay motherhood at the risk of losing their fertility, one doctor believes he has found the answer: pausing biological time by freezing ovarian tissue. Victoria Lambert sees him at work.

Source: Telegraph >> Read Full Article

Dr Life: Sherman Silber is to breaking new ground in the battle against infertility Photo: Courtesy of the St Louis Clinic

A small, warm-faced man, with sharp darting eyes and quickfire chatter, Dr Sherman Silber is used to breaking new ground.

He has led and collaborated on research all over the world on techniques – ranging from sperm retrieval to embryo transfer and storage – that improve the chance of conception, and he was the first surgeon to transplant a testicle.

His latest weapon in the war against infertility is his pioneering method of ovarian tissue freezing, a technique that could see women halting their biological clock and preserving their fertility for a later date.

‘Patients come to see me from all over the world with the most complicated and tricky situations, the difficult cases that have failed elsewhere,’ Dr Silber says at his clinic, the Infertility Centre of St Louis, in Missouri.

‘But in essence they all want the same thing, a baby, so we sit them down, go through their history and work out what to do. We try to help – without letting them waste time or money on procedures that don’t work.’

Silber makes it sound straightforward. But the figures on infertility are stark: it is estimated that one in seven couples worldwide are infertile – about 3.5 million in Britain – with 75 per cent of the responsibility shared fairly evenly between men (poor-quality or no sperm) and women (due mostly to tubal blockages and inability to ovulate). The remaining 25 per cent is apparently unexplained. But Silber is sure of the reason: maternal age.

‘There is a worldwide infertility epidemic, and it’s due to women – understandably – putting off childbirth,’ he says. ‘They’re waiting until their late thirties/early forties to have a family – and by then their fertility is seriously on the wane.’ … >> Continue Reading

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