Frozen embryo success rates -better?

[Blankspace4]

I’ve been looking at success rates (which I think monitor pregnancy, not live births) at a number of clinics and it seems the frozen success rate is better than fresh.

Is this everyone else’s understanding too and if so what is the science behind this?!

Also more generally if going through a frozen cycle what is the process, I’m guessing a lot less drugs the second time round?

We are on the waiting list for NHS treatment but they only fund 1 (fresh) cycle, but I think freezing is an option offered too.

Thanks in advance for any help / thoughts

My general sense - and admittedly this is not based on having read up on it in detail - is that the embryos that make it to freeze tend to be better quality ones. So, at least part of it probably has to do with the fact that to be able to do an FET you have to have had something to freeze in the first place - most of the drop-off has already happened at that point. So, that can potentially translate into better success rates, but not necessarily because of the FET itself, iyswim.

Just read this article www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6096615/Radical-new-approach-IVF-DOUBLES-chance-getting-pregnant-62-cent-say-experts.html

I’m sorry it is the daily mail! Don’t read the comments (people are vile!)

I’m looking at ivf too so I’ll mention this to my doctor at my next appointment and see what he says x

We did FET because we did IVF so we could have our embryos tested for a genetic condition we didn’t want to pass on (offered on the NHS:amazing!). I’m not sure on success rates compared to fresh as fresh wasn’t an option for us, but agree with what persipan says about embryos that make it to freezing - we had 12 fertilised eggs, and by day 5, 4 had survived to be frozen (and our first transfer resulted in our baby, so at least one of them was pretty strong! Feel super lucky as we were given a success rate of 33% for pregnancy, nothing on live births that I could find)

The FET process was less intense for me physically than the egg collection bit, but I’m not keen on needles so think having tablets and pessaries rather than lots of injections was a help there!

Good luck whatever you decide

Thanks for the link. It’s interesting and does make some logical sense. I’m not sure if my clinic offers this though - at least not in this order! l will ask / discuss at my next appointment.

I've no experience yet but the clinic I'm with are doing a study which you can sign up to due to the higher success rates of frozen transfer. They only do the usual one fresh then two frozen on the NHS bit if you join the study and your selected for the frozen transfer you wont have any fresh transfers. Our consultant thinks the higher success rates are because your body is given a month or so to recover after all the stimulating hormones.

Like persipan said it will likely be the fact the embryos transferred frozen were of better quality, most clinics will only freeze blasts and won't freeze low quality/fragmented embryos so the embryos being transferred on a FET are often of better quality, a lot of the fresh transfers will be day 2/3 lower grades

The genetic screening PP mentions will likely be PGD which screens for a specific gene disorder and can in some cases be covered by the NHS if you have an inheritable genetic condition in your family, PGS which is general screening for chromosomes is offered at a lot of clinics but isn't usually funded, some clinics put PGS tested FET cycles in the results which also may skew it, for eg in some age groups a ET may have a 20% chance of live birth but an FET with a PGS tested euploid embryo could have a 60-70% chance of success in the same age group.

lauren yep, bang on. Sorry, I should’ve been clearer: was trying not to chuck too many acronyms around!

@Verbena87 so glad it worked for you and you got your little one! I work in a clinic and know of loads of couples who can't get funding for PGD so I'm very pleased you did. I have an IVF baby at home too

lauren thanks - we feel ridiculously lucky on all sorts of levels: we got the funding, we got pregnant from our first FET, all 4 of our surviving embryos were clear of the affected gene so we’ve 3 left in the freezer. I was very ready for a long drawn out journey that possibly ended in accepting a child-free life, so feel incredibly privileged.

Seems UK clinics are catching up with foreign clinics.

I am about to start cycle 2 in a clinic in Europe, the consultant right from the start in cycle 1 had told us they advised most patients that FET is better than fresh. The reason for this is because those hormones that we inject are for egg development and create a less than ideal condition in the uterine lining for the embryo. They prefer the body to be rid of those hormones before implanting as its more of a natural environment for the embryo and therefore higher success rates.