Doctors have revealed that a mother undergoing IVF died after experiencing a very unusual adverse effect.
The unidentified 23-year-old woman from Delhi, India, passed away suddenly as medics collected her eggs.
The woman, who had been married for seven years and had a natural-born daughter aged four, appeared to be in good health when she arrived at the hospital for the treatment.
However, when fertility professionals attempted to remove her eggs, her heart stopped. They were unable to do CPR on her.
She died of ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS), a condition that affects one in three women undergoing in vitro fertilization.
Director of the fertility charity Progress Educational Trust, Sarah Norcross, told that the danger of death from OHSS is “vanishingly uncommon.”
Less than one percent of instances are serious, according to the study.
In severe cases, the illness can leave individuals unable to breathe due to blood clots in the lungs caused by deadly ovarian enlargement.
Doctors wrote in the journal Autopsy and Case Reports that the patient’s medical history and test results suggested that she was a “healthy young woman” before beginning IVF.
She began ovarian stimulation, the initial phase of in vitro fertilization, which entails taking medications to increase the number of eggs produced by the ovaries.
This is done so that doctors can gather as many eggs as possible for fertilization, hence expanding the selection of embryos that can be implanted.
After eleven days, the patient was reported to the hospital for egg collection, the next physical step in the IVF process.
Dr. Swati Tyagi and her team noted in their report that her blood pressure and pulse rate were normal.
During the 15 to 20-minute surgery, during which she was sedated, doctors did an ultrasound and began harvesting eggs from her ovaries using a needle.
After an egg was removed from the patient’s right ovary, however, the patient’s blood pressure, heart rate, and oxygen levels decreased.
Doctors abandoned the procedure immediately because they could not find her heartbeat.
They began CPR, infused her with medicines, and used a defibrillator in an attempt to restart her heart.
However, her heartbeat remained nonexistent and she could not be resurrected.
Due to the suddenness of her death, medical professionals conducted an autopsy. It revealed that her ovaries, which are typically 3 cm in diameter, were around three times larger than normal.
She had nine to ten swollen follicles on the wall of each ovary, as well as fluid around her belly and lungs, both of which are indicative of OHSS.
Experts found that she died from acute pulmonary edema, which is a blood clot-induced buildup of fluid in the lungs that makes it difficult to breathe, and was precipitated by OHSS and led to cardiac arrest.
OHSS is a potentially fatal side effect of fertility medicines, which are administered before egg collection to stimulate the ovaries and cause egg growth.
For one-third of IVF patients, the medications induce the ovaries to produce an excessive number of follicles — the egg-containing sac.
This produces modest belly swelling, pain, and nausea in the great majority of women for a brief duration.
However, 1 in 100 IVF patients experiences moderate or severe OHSS, which causes painful abdominal swelling, urinary retention, and difficulty breathing.
In extreme circumstances, women may develop blood clots in their legs or lungs.
When this occurs, blood vessel fluid may leak into the abdomen and the area surrounding the heart and lungs.
An estimated one woman each week in the United Kingdom suffers from severe OHSS.
Ms. Norcross stated, “The chance of death from OHSS is vanishingly small among egg donors.”
‘It is necessary to spread the news that this has occurred and to bring attention to the investigation into the egg donor’s death so that everyone in the reproductive industry can learn from it.
It may also prompt reproductive professionals to reconsider how they inform egg donors about the associated hazards.
In the past three decades, the number of couples receiving IVF has increased by threefold. Since 1991, IVF has resulted in the birth of around 390,000 children in the United Kingdom and more than a million in the United States.
Over eight out of ten couples conceive naturally after one year of trying.
IVF and intrauterine insemination (IUI) — when sperm is put into a woman’s uterus — are covered by the NHS for couples who have been unsuccessfully attempting to conceive.
