A pilot survey on obstetric complications in pregnant women with a history of repeated embryo implantation failure and those undergoing single local endometrial injury

Abstract

To assess if a history of repeated implantation failure (RIF) or local endometrial injury (LEI) for RIF affects the pregnancy course in women who conceived in the subsequent in vitro fertilization (IVF)-embryo/blastocyst transfer (ET/BT) cycle.Of 42 pregnant women with a history of three consecutive failed ET/BT cycles with negative pregnancy tests, 11 patients had a clinical pregnancy in the immediate subsequent ET/BT cycle following (the RIF group), whereas 31 patients had a clinical pregnancy in the subsequent ET/BT cycle following single curettage LEI in the proliferative phase of the preceding spontaneous cycle (the RIF/LEI group). Information on the obstetric complications were retrieved from medical records and compared with that of women who had a live birth in the first ET/BT attempt (the control group). Results: The clinical pregnancy rate, ongoing pregnancy rate, and live birth rate were significantly higher in the RIF/LEI group than in the RIF group (p < 0.010). There were no significant differences in the incidence of pregnancy of unknown location, ectopic pregnancy, miscarriage, stillbirth, preterm birth, premature rupture of the membranes, placenta previa, placental abruption, preeclampsia, pregnancy-induced hypertension, gestational diabetes, fetal growth restriction, caesarean section, and blood transfusion were similar between the three groups (p > 0.31).In this pilot survey, neither a history of RIF nor LEI intervention for RIF increased the incidence of obstetric complications in the women who conceived in the subsequent ET/BT cycle.