THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, February 25, 1995 TAG: 9502250244
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARIE JOYCE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
Chicago scientists have managed to move one more step of the reproductive process from the human body to a petri dish.
If the results can be duplicated in other labs, the technique will mean a major advance for in vitro fertilization, said Gary D. Hodgen, president of the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine, part of Norfolk's Eastern Virginia Medical School.
Doctors at Chicago's Highland Park Hospital matured a woman's eggs in a petri dish, then successfully fertilized them with sperm from the woman's fiance, the Chicago Tribune reported Friday.
The process used at clinics now involves treating women with drugs so their bodies will do the job of maturing extra eggs - a practice with several big drawbacks.
If the new technique can be perfected and duplicated, it probably will become the standard for in vitro fertilization, said Hodgen.
``This is the future,'' he said. The Jones Institute has been ``working on that intensely ourselves.''
The Highland Park doctors are apparently the first in the United States to accomplish the procedure, the Tribune reported. Doctors in Korea and Australia also say they've had success.
The process used today at Jones works like this: the woman is treated with several drugs that override her body chemistry and force her ovaries to mature many eggs at once - maybe as many as 20 in young women, or as few as three in women nearing menopause.
Doctors use a probe to harvest the mature eggs, then fertilize them in petri dishes. Some are implanted in the mother's uterus, and the rest are frozen to use if the first attempt doesn't work.
In the new process, said Hodgen, doctors would use a small needle to remove a plug of tissue from an ovary, then harvest dozens of immature eggs from it.
Most would be frozen, but several would be put in petri dishes, along with a biochemical mixture that mimics conditions in the ovaries.
The case in Chicago involved a woman with cancer who had a hysterectomy. She and her finance told the Chicago Tribune they plan to find a surrogate mother to bear their child in a few years.
But Hodgen said the procedure would have many practical applications for the typical Jones patients, who seek in vitro fertilization because they have had trouble conceiving a child.
It would be less expensive, he said. The drugs that stimulate egg maturation cost about $600 per treatment, and if the fertilized embryos don't take hold in the uterus, the women may undergo the treatment several times.
Clinics also could avoid some ethical issues that have dogged them. Some people say the current procedure is wrong because it creates and freezes human embryos that may never be used.
Under the new process, clinics probably would freeze only the immature eggs, and would fertilize only as many as they planned to use, Hodgen said.
He said the new technique also could aid a woman who wants to delay childbearing but worries about declining fertility. She could have her eggs harvested when she is young and has more.
Or she could use the young eggs to diminish the risk of bearing a child with a chromosomal disorder. Those odds increase with the age of the mother.
Hodgen said the Jones Institute will study the work of the Chicago scientists.
He whooped Friday when he heard the name of the Chicago fertility center's medical director, Dr. Edward Marut.
Marut worked under Hodgen as a research fellow at the National Institutes of Health in 1980 and 1981. Hodgen said he planned to call his former protege and congratulate him.
``When you have fellows, for the rest of your life, they're like your children,'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: Color graphic by Janet Shaughnessy, Staff
How it would work
KEYWORDS: IN VITRO FERTILIZATION by CNB