Yes, years of research and consistent development of IVF have made this fertility treatment a safe and effective procedure. You can always rely on the top infertility clinic, Indira IVF, housing cutting-edge technology and renowned fertility specialists with years of experience.

Evolution of Fertility Treatments and Development of IVF

Q: Who was the first IVF baby?

The first IVF baby was born in July 1978 and named Louise Brown. She was born in Manchester, UK.

Q: Who are test-tube babies?

Any child born through the process of IVF instead of a natural birth is referred to as a test-tube baby.

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Last updated: March 19, 2025

Synopsis

The evolution of fertility treatments and the development of IVF goes decades back, with the first successful IVF pregnancy taking place in 1978. Since then, medical science has continued to introduce newer advancements to the procedure, such as advanced hatching and embryo screenings.

Artificial Insemination

John Hunter performed the first known human artificial insemination procedure in the 1770s. It was suggested that a textile merchant gather semen in a heated syringe and inject the sample into the vagina.

Later, in the middle of the nineteenth century, Dr. J Marion Sims revealed his results from 55 inseminations and postcoital tests. He thought that ovulation happened during menstruation, which may account for the fact that there was only one pregnancy.

In 1884, American doctor William Pancoast used a modified version of artificial insemination by injecting donor sperm into an anaesthetised lady. The married woman, who was unaware that she had been impregnated with donor sperm, gave birth to a child nine months later.

The Foundations of IVF

The development of IVF was made possible by a number of breakthroughs made between the 1920s and 1960s. Medical scientists discovered progesterone in 1929 after identifying oestrogen, a crucial hormone for female reproduction, in 1923.

Hormone supplements that increase fertility had been developed by 1943. IVF testing on mice and rabbits started in the 1950s, opening the door for its use in humans. The building of fertility-boosting medications in the 1960s strengthened reproductive treatments even more. The first human egg cell was fertilised in 1969 after scientists successfully extracted and fertilised human eggs for the first time in 1968.

The chances of getting pregnant increased as a result of this progress, especially in the areas of fertility supplements and medications, which also helped doctors better regulate and schedule ovulation and egg growth.

Cryopreservation

The first time that sperm cells were cryopreserved was in 1953, and the first time that embryos were cryopreserved was 25 years later. After conducting many tests, Dr. Christopher Chen of Singapore used frozen eggs to achieve the first assisted pregnancy in history in 1986.

The future of cryopreservation in assisted reproduction looks promising. Eggs, sperm, and embryos can be frozen, which is particularly beneficial for infertile couples who wish to postpone getting pregnant. We will have greater access to and use of this technology in the future with time, effort, and plenty of experimenting.

The First IVF Baby

An important day in the history of reproductive medicine is July 25, 1978. The first child to be born through in vitro fertilisation, Louise Brown, was born on this day.

Through the development of IVF, the doctors were able to successfully fertilise her parents' eggs and sperm outside of the uterus in 1977. In 2010, the doctors were awarded a Nobel Prize for their efforts. Millions of couples with infertility issues now have hope of becoming parents because of this innovative treatment method.

On October 3, 1978, Kanupriya Agarwal was born, making her the first and second test-tube baby in India and the globe, respectively. The first doctor in India and the second in the world to produce a child in a test tube is Dr. Subhash Mukherjee.

Egg Donation

In 1983, the first successful cycle of human egg donation was carried out in the US.

At that point, it was the donor's reproductive tract where the egg was fertilised before it was removed from her uterus. The recipient then had a transcervical transfer of the embryo. Even though it was a historic first, this donor egg cycle was far from ideal.

First of all, there were numerous technological challenges in collecting the fertilised egg from the donor, in addition to the possibility of infectious illness transmission.

cond, compared to the possibility of physically extracting the donor eggs and fertilising them in vitro, the recovery of a single embryo was inefficient.

ICSI

As compared to natural sperm penetration, intracytoplasmic sperm injection, or ICSI, involves injecting a single live sperm into an egg. This type of IVF treatment is advised in cases of male-factor infertility. The first successful ICSI-assisted birth took place in 1992, after the procedure was initially carried out in 1987.

PGS and PGD

PGS increases in vitro fertilisation success rates by guaranteeing the transfer of euploid embryos, which have a greater likelihood of implantation and live birth. PGD makes it possible to transfer unharmed embryos and identify embryos with particular mutations that cause disease.

Assisted Hatching

Assisted hatching, another step in the development of IVF, was originally suggested in the 1980s. Patients receiving treatment with in vitro fertilisation (IVF) can have this procedure done. When fertilisation is done, the embryo is covered in a hard outer layer of cells known as the zona pellucida. This outer layer can be thought of as the embryo's "shell." For an embryo to implant into the uterus and develop into a pregnancy, it must escape its shell. By making a tiny gap in the zona pellucida, we can help the embryo in "hatching" from its shell.

EmbryoScope

Doctors can keep an eye on embryos during every stage of development with the EmbryoScope without having to remove them from the incubator. Because the embryos remain in the incubator in a controlled environment during their development, this prevents any potential harm to them.

The incubator's attached camera and microscope also take a picture of the embryos after every 10 minutes.

Conclusion

Since its first use in 1978, IVF has developed a lot, and its success rates are still increasing. Indira IVF takes care to stay informed of the development of IVF and the evolution of fertility treatments that can improve the effectiveness of the procedure.