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Only Two shots!! The application of corifollitropin alfa helps you to have a baby in the IVF treatment.



Having an appointment with doctor is not a good memory, because it is always linked with taking bitter medicines, or receiving painful injections. Those amiable nurses always said, "it won't be that dread as it looks. Trust me! It’s nothing more than being bitten by mosquitoes. Ok, take a deep breath...!!" And you have known the result - it was really painful until you pressed the puncture wound for several minutes. Most people couldn't forget the fearsome to take the injections.




However, taking several injections is just the basic tips for the patients who are involved in the program of intrauterine insemination (IUI) or of in-vitro fertilization (IVF). Having one to three shots daily is one of the unbearable things besides waiting for the result of pregnancy test.

The primary follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) injection has been developed in 1950. Because of the unstable extracts, the quality of retrieved eggs was poor and the following results of embryo culturing were generally not good. The first generation of FSH shot was intramuscular injection, and it caused inflammatory reactions quite often. Until 90s, the 100% pure recombinant FSH shots have been released through the rapid growth of genetic engineering. It has not only increased the quality of retrieved eggs and the following cultured embryo, but also provided IVF patients a friendly operative method -- the injection pen. The easier way of taking shots encourages IVF patients to do the injections by themselves for saving the time costs, and the subcutaneous injection relieves the pain as well. 


In spite of so many advantages of the recombinant FSH, the frequency of injection still couldn’t be reduced depending on the individual dosage. In 2011, a more advanced recombinant FSH, corifollitropin alfa (Elonva®), has been developed. It has a longer half life but with similar pharmacologic action in human body, which means that only one shot of corifollitropin alfa can stimulate the growth of ovarian multi-follicles for seven days. According to the official protocol, one shot of corifollitropin alfa plus several short-half-life FSH shots and antagonists of pituitary gland are required. But the frequency of injection seems not being reduced quite much.




Do we have a better modification to the original corifollitropin-alfa protocol? Since February 2013, Stork Fertility Center has started corifollitropin-alfa protocol and has recruited clinical data from 200 IVF patients,

Maturation rate of retrieved oocytes (MR)
Good embryo rate of Day 3 culture (GER)a
Good blastocyst rate of Day 5 culture (GBR)b
Corifollitropin alfa
72.4%
60.9%
59.1%
Traditional recombinant FSH
78.5%
61.3%
58.9%
aGER: >Grade 2, at least 6 cells
bGBR: Inner cell mass at least > grade B, trophectoderm cell at least > grade C
(based on Gardner grading system)

The different treatment was that we modified the original protocol as beginning with corifollitropin-alfa injection and supplementing the follicle growth with LH (Luveris) or antagonist (Cetrotide) based on the serum hormone results on D5/D7/D9. Then the frequency of injection has been efficiently reduced by accurate hormone control.
Furthermore, Stork Fertility Center has improved this protocol as beginning with corifollitropin-alfa injection and following serum hormone control only in the recent half year. If the hormone results (E2, LH and P4) and the follicle size displayed rational values during the whole follicle inductive program, we only administer the final trigger shot in the end. Then the patients’ pressure to the IVF program and the cost of the medicine are friendly decreased.


Retrieving the oocytes with better quality has been a tendency in the IVF realm recently. The quality of oocyte is before the quantity of oocyte. Who said that IVF program equals to so many shots in your life? Two shots are enough!
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