13.11.2018
Münster - The UKM Fertility Center is five years old. On this occasion, the director Andreas Schüring present us the family. She has taken on a lot, until it worked with the offspring.
Britta Borgmann and her husband Jens are sitting loosely in the seating area of the newly designed premises of the UKM Fertility Center on the occasion of the fifth anniversary. Four-year-old Michel sits down at the table with Lego, while Carlotta, twelve weeks old, is breastfed by Mama Britta.
"We present: Our third and eighth attempt to have a child," smiles the 38-year-old. And her husband Jens makes it clear that the couple had given up the hope of a family at no time despite the efforts. "We have always been positive. You just have to adjust to a marathon, not a sprint, "said the 35-year-old in a press release from the University Hospital Münster.
For the fact that they are a family today, the Borgmanns, who first came to the Fertility Center in 2011, have taken a lot on themselves. In her case, the cause of childlessness was a reduced sperm count in men.
Because of a previous illness Jens Borgmann knew since youth days that he would probably have difficulties to become a father. Therefore, after about one year of unsuccessful attempts, the couple turned to the UKM Fertility Center.
"One-third of the couples are just like the Borgmanns, because there are too few sperm to naturally produce a child," says dr. Andreas Schüring, the head of the center, for the gynecologists and men's doctors (andrologists) work together under one roof. In a third of other reasons are found in the woman: a disturbance of ovulation, the fallopian tube function, for example, or a Einnistungsheminder in the uterus.
"And in about a third of cases, we can not pinpoint exactly what infertility really is. Often, several factors also play a role," explains Schüring.
Because of the low sperm count Borgmanns only a so-called ICSI - an artificial insemination by intracytoplasmic sperm injection - in question: Britta Borgmann was given a preparatory follicle stimulating hormone so mature in her body several oocytes that were finally removed.
After fertilization by injection under the microscope and cultivation in the Petri dish, the resulting embryos are then inserted into the uterus. With Britta Borgmann the first two attempts of the transfer did not work out. The embryos did not nibble at the end. "Ultimately, that is the selection of nature that we can not prevent and do not want," says Schüring.
The four-year-old Michel, on the other hand, is the pleasing result of a fertilized egg cell stored in ice. The fertilized, supernumerary oocytes are in fact frozen and - in the event that the first attempts fail - later "thawed" and then used as an embryo in the uterus.
This was achieved three years later with the little Carlotta. "The chance in a fresh attempt to become pregnant with ICSI is about 25 to 30 percent, the chance to get a child after cryopreservation in ice then at least 20," says Schüring.
