Is it helpful to inject the pregnancy hormone to the womb of women undergoing fertility treatment?

What is it about?

Subfertility affects around 15% of couples and represents inability to become pregnant naturally following 12 months of regular unprotected sexual intercourse. For many subfertile couples who want to have a baby, assisted reproduction (handling sperm and eggs in the laboratory to create embryos for transfer into the womb) can help. Unfortunately the proportion of embryos that survive following transfer into the womb has remained small since the mid-1990s. The pregnancy hormone called human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) has an important role in the early stages of pregnancy, so administering hCG to the womb of subfertile women undergoing assisted reproduction treatment is a novel approach that has been suggested to increase the chances of having a baby.

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Why is it important?

Subfertility affects around 15% of couples, but assisted reproduction including the administration of hCG to the womb could help these families to have a baby.

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