Embryo testing on backburner

By MONIQUE DEVEREUX

An Auckland fertility clinic may send embryos to Melbourne for screening in a successful world-first programme there, rather than continuing to develop its own technique for detecting defects.

Fertility Associates director Dr Bert Stewart and some of his team visited the Melbourne in-vitro fertilisation clinic in November after hearing about its programme called CGH - comparative genomic hybridisation.

Now the Auckland clinic has decided to put its own similar screening test on hold and will look at using the Melbourne technology to help childless clients.

In CGH screening, a single cell is taken from a frozen, fertilised egg, or embryo, from which specialists can count and analyse the chromosomes.

In the past specialists have been able to look at only five pairs of chromosomes in each cell, but the new technology allows all 23 pairs to be analysed, making sure they are intact and without defects.

An embryo in which all 23 chromosomes exist defect-free is less likely to miscarrying, greatly improving the woman's chances of having a baby in just one IVF cycle.

Each cycle can cost up to $6000 so unsuccessful attempts can be heartbreaking for infertile couples.

Dr Stewart said the development of the CGH programme was moving quickly but was still very labour-intensive.

Fertility Associates was hoping to adopt the programme once it had been developed further, or gain access to the technology by sending embryos to Melbourne for screening.

Dr Stewart hoped New Zealand couples would be able to take advantage of the CGH programme "one way or another in the not-too-distance future", perhaps as soon as this year.

But that could mean Fertility Associates has to go back to the Ministry of Health's national ethics committee to gain approval.

There may also be restrictions in both Victorian and New Zealand law on embryos being sent between countries.

Dr Stewart said that aspect would have to be looked into closely.

But the Melbourne developments meant that a similar screening programme Fertility Associates was trying to set up here would be "put on the backburner for a bit".

A year ago the clinic won ethics committee approval to complete a feasibility study for the programme call Fish - Fluorescent In-Situ Hybridisation - which can also weed out healthy embryos from those unlikely to develop into viable pregnancies.

At the time Dr Stewart said the company did not want to "promise the Earth" to women who were having trouble conceiving.

However, based on similar programmes in other Western countries, embryo screening almost always resulted in a higher number of pregnancies.

The difference between the two programmes was that Fish could only count the number of chromosomes.

Several babies are understood to have been born in Melbourne from trials of the CGH programme last year.

nzherald.co.nz/health