EC Paediatrics

In vitro fertilization (IVF) refers to a procedure designed to overcome infertility and produce a pregnancy as a direct result of the intervention. 

We reviewed all newborns admitted in NICU during a period of five years. There was a total 2875 cases. 

Of these, 68 were IVF newborns. 

The purpose of the study was to see how many newborns showed malformations, compared with other non-IVF group and related this finding with the gestational age, birth weight and common complications of prematurely like hyaline membrane disorder (HMD) and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC). 

The gestational age (GA) of IVF newborns admitted in NICU was mainly between 32-36W+6 and their birth weight (BW) was between 1.5 and 2.5 kg.

Four of the IVF newborns admitted to NICU had congenital malformations (The rate was 5.8%) compared with zero cases in non IVF group. This result was statistically significant. The malformations detected were: duodenal atresia, anal atresia, cleft lip and palate, ventricular septal defect. 

The incidence of prematurity, low birth body weight, short term complications (HMD, NEC) and long hospital stays in IVF group is higher than non-IVF group and are also statistically significant. 

The mortality rate of both groups was statistically not relevant.

According to our study, there are more malformations in IVF group compared with non IVF group. On the other hand seems that those malformations are not related with BW, GA and complications of prematurity. 

We conclude that although our retrospective study showed statistically significant malformations on IVF (5.8%) compared to non-IVF group, we cannot conclude that is more frequent, because the result is not too much different from the general newborn population malformation rate (3 - 5%).

Keywords: In Vitro Fertilization; Malformations

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