July 25 is World Embryologist Day, and the development of IVF technology is inseparable from the silent efforts of embryologists. General IVF patients will not meet with the embryologist, but little is known about the process of in vitro embryo culture after egg retrieval, today AA69 Fertility Center will take you to reveal: how about the embryo culture process after egg retrieval?
Generally, after egg retrieval, the embryologist will receive the male sperm for processing, and then put the eggs in a specific Petri dish for culture, during which the embryo will continue to observe the development of the embryo, until the 3rd or 5th day to inform the embryo development, the embryo is graded.
Day 0 of embryo culture: the eggs are removed in vitro and placed in the embryo culture solution prepared in advance, and after a few hours, the optimized sperm is added for in vitro fertilization, or intracytoplasmic sperm injection is done;
Day 1 of embryo culture: in the morning observe if the eggs are fertilized (whether there are two pronuclear);
Day 2 of embryo culture: observe whether the fertilized egg divides, whether there are several cells (4 cells are best), whether there is fragmentation (no fragments are good), whether the cell division is uniform (division is evenly good);
Day 3 of embryo culture: same as day 2, see if there are several cells (8-10 cells are best), see if there is debris and whether the cell division is uniform;
Embryos are selected for transfer on day 3 (the number of embryos will be determined based on age, physical condition, and previous IVF history). A good embryo should be an 8-cell that has been divided 3 times, and sometimes there will be an embryo with 4 to 7 cells or more than 8 cells. If the embryos are not transferred at this time, the embryos must be transferred to the newly prepared embryo culture solution and cultured until the blastocysts are formed, or the embryos are cryopreserved.
Day 4 of embryo culture: embryonic development to the mulberry embryo stage;
Day 5 of embryo culture: Embryos develop into blastocyst stages.
At this time, good embryos should divide more than 6 times and form blastocysts . Some blastocysts have begun to hatch or have hatched completely from the pellucida, especially on day 6. Implantation rates are high at the blastocyst stage, but in practice, blastocyst culture requires high conditions, and if the embryo has poor development potential, it may stop developing and wait until day 5 without embryo transfer to the patient.
Therefore, whether to raise a sac should be based on the number of embryos and embryo quality of the patient, it is best to follow the doctor's advice, do not feel that the blastocyst implantation rate is high, adhere to the sac, otherwise there may be no embryos available.