October 2011 - Almost 10 million American women of childbearing age are affected by chronic pelvic pain, gastrointestinal and urinary tract difficulties and infertility due to endometriosis, a strange condition, in which cells normally forming the lining of the uterus (endometrium) start colonizing other organs and tissues beyond the uterus.
In 2003, Matthew Rabinowitz's sister, then 32, gave birth to a baby boy with Down syndrome, who died six days later. While pregnant, she had routine tests for possible problems -- blood screening and an ultrasound -- but they failed to detect the extra chromosome that causes the condition.
When it comes to conceiving a child, there are lots of things that can go wrong—sperm allergies, poor egg quality, and ineffective sperm. Of the approximately one in 10 couples who are infertile, it has been estimated that male factors alone contribute to 30 percent of these cases.
Ejaculated sperm has been shown to be significantly damaged by prolonged exposure to a WiFi connected laptop. A study, published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, found that after four hours of exposure there was a significant decrease in sperm motility and an increase in sperm DNA fragmentation.
Researchers at Oxford University have developed a test that may help to improve IVF success rates by checking the health of embryos.
The team, led by Dr Dagan Wells, has apparently developed a test which checks embryos during IVF for abnormal numbers of chromosomes. They tested a few cells taken from early human embryos, each of which should contain 23 pairs of chromosomes. With more or less than this, embryos can fail to develop normally.
For the first time, a study in humans suggests that a controversial, estrogen-like chemical in plastic may be related to conditions that reduce men's fertility.
Men with higher levels of BPA, or bisphenol A, were two to four times more likely than others to have problems with sperm quality and quantity, the study shows.
For men and women who yearn for children and try unsuccessfully to conceive, sometimes for years, fertility problems can be devastating. In recent decades many technologies have been developed, such as in vitro fertilization, that help people conceive a child much more successfully.
March is National Endometriosis Awareness Month, so it's time to increase your knowledge about a disease that can cause debilitating pain and is estimated to affect 6.3 million women in the United States.