Clinical outcome of cycles with oocyte degeneration after intracytoplasmic sperm injection

Lanlan LiuReproductive Medicine Center, Affiliated Chenggong Hospital of Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China;The 174 Hospital of PLA, Xiamen, Fujian, ChinaView further author information

Jiali CaiReproductive Medicine Center, Affiliated Chenggong Hospital of Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China;The 174 Hospital of PLA, Xiamen, Fujian, ChinaView further author information

Ping LiReproductive Medicine Center, Affiliated Chenggong Hospital of Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China;The 174 Hospital of PLA, Xiamen, Fujian, ChinaView further author information

Xiaoming JiangReproductive Medicine Center, Affiliated Chenggong Hospital of Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China;The 174 Hospital of PLA, Xiamen, Fujian, ChinaView further author information

Jianzhi RenReproductive Medicine Center, Affiliated Chenggong Hospital of Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China;The 174 Hospital of PLA, Xiamen, Fujian, ChinaCorrespondence[email protected]
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ABSTRACT

There are variant rates of oocyte degeneration after intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) among different patients. Oocyte degeneration after ICSI may reflect the cohort of oocyte quality and subsequent embryo development capacity and clinical outcome. This retrospective study analyzed 255 cycles with at least one degenerated oocyte after ICSI (degeneration group) and 243 cycles with no degenerated oocytes after ICSI (control group). Basic characteristics like female age, body mass index, duration of infertility, hormone (FSH, LH, E₂) levels on day 3 of menses, and primary infertility patient rate were similar between the two groups (p > 0.05). Total dose of gonadotropin and length of stimulation were also similar between the two groups (p > 0.05), but the degeneration group exhibited a more exuberant response to ovarian stimulation as reflected by more oocytes retrieved (p < 0.05). The number of 2PN embryos available and high quality embryos were similar between the two groups (p > 0.05), but the high quality embryo rate, early cleavage embryo rate, and available embryo rate were all statistically lower than the control group (p < 0.05). Embryo developmental kinetics seemed to be disturbed and embryo fragmentation rate increased in the degeneration group (p < 0.05). However, there was no statistical difference in the distribution of graded embryos transferred, and there were no statistical differences in the pregnancy rate, implantation rate, and abortion rate between the two groups (p > 0.05). We deduce that the presence of oocyte degeneration after ICSI may be associated with decreased embryo quality with embryo development kinetics disturbed. However, the clinical outcomes may not be affected if the premise that sufficient high quality degeneration group embryos are available for transfer.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank all the staff, especially the embryologists in our lab for their support in generating this manuscript.

Declaration of interests

This work was partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81302454) and Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province (2015D016). The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.