The advantages of a group embryo culture approach for women of advanced age: A prospective study from a Tunisian reproductive center

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the impact of a group embryo culture approach for women of advanced age.

Methods: In this prospective study, two embryo culturing strategies—group and individual—were compared in women who were older (≥35 years) and younger (<35 years). Data was collected from 450 embryos over 291 intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) cycles performed on 291 patients. A grouped embryo culture group and an individual embryo culture group were generated by selecting the zygotes into two groups based on the type of culture that was used. The main outcomes compared between the groups were the pregnancy and the live birth rates.

Results: The pregnancy, and live births rates were significantly higher when group culture was carried out in an advanced-aged women group (41.5% vs. 25.0%, P=0.04; 14.3% vs. 6.6%, P=0.04; respectively). Similarly, the cleavage rate was better in the same group (98.6% vs. 91.2%, P=0.001). However, in the group of young women, there were not significant differences in these rates.

Conclusions: Group embryo culturing seems to be a promising strategy to improve embryo development and live births for patients over 35 years of age.

Keywords

Group embryo-culture / Individual embryoculture / Embryo quality / Human IVF / Maternal advanced-age

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Funding

This research did not receive any specific funding.

Authors’ contributions

Khadija Kacem Berjeb and Sana Chtourou conceived and designed the study. Mounir Ben Mefteh and Marouen Braham conducted the oocytes pick up; Linda Debbabi, Sana Chtourou and Khadija Kacem Berjeb contributed to the interpretation of data; Khadija Kacem Berjeb, Sana Chtourou, Maha Bouyahya and Neila Ben Othman drafted the manuscript; Anis Fadhlaoui, Fethi Zhioua, Nozha Chakroun and Olfa Bahri provided expertise throughout the study and contributed to the critical revision of the manuscript.

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