Human Reproduction, Vol. 16, No. 4, 801,
April 2001
© 2001 European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology
Letters to the editor |
Should ICSI be the treatment for all cases of in-vitro conception?
Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen Maternity Hospital, Foresterhill, Aberdeen AB25 2ZD, UK E-mail: m.hamilton@abdn.ac.uk
Dear Sir,
We were interested to read the paper by Fishel et al. and intrigued by the title—`Should ICSI be the treatment choice in all cases of in-vitro conception?' (Fishel et al., 2000
).
This is an important clinical question and the authors are to be commended for raising the issue. Unfortunately the title of the paper is a little misleading since the data presented do not answer the question posed in the title, at least from a clinical perspective.
Firstly, the patients in this study, by definition, formed a selected group, who would normally have been offered ICSI by most clinics. They included couples with previous failed conventional IVF, or males with abnormal semen parameters, and as such could not be described as a routine IVF population. It would be inappropriate to extrapolate results based on this sample population to a general pool of IVF couples.
Secondly,
References
CARE (Centres for Assisted Reproduction), The Park Hospital, Sherwood Lodge Drive, Burntstump Country Park, Arnold, Nottingham NG5 8RX UK Biogenesi, Casa di Cura, Villa Europa, Via Eufrate 27, 00144 Rome, Italy Vitalab, Box 46337 Orange Grove, 2119 Republic of South Africa