PGT-A testing of frozen embryos

[BellaRosex]

Hi all,

Has anyone ever opted to have their embryos PGT-A tested after they've already been frozen? I regret not doing it at the time but there was nothing in my circumstances that dictated doing it and my clinic didn't advise.

Now following recurrent miscarriages, I'm starting to consider whether I should. I also have multiple fibroids (one submucosal) and the others intramural, which grew during IVF. I've also been considering surgery to remove these but I've been warned it could end up doing more harm than good.

I can't be sure if my issues are uterine or due to the embryo so thought at least PGT-A testing would help me narrow down potential issues.

Just curious if anyone has done this and whether their embryos have survived the process. Worried about damaging otherwise good embryos.

Many thanks in advance 🙏🏻

Hello, I had an similar experience as you. Miscarriage from what was almost certainly a chromosomally abnormal embryo due to certain markers during the pregnancy. Then we had a BFN from our next FET. We seriously considered testing our remaining frozen embryos but decided not to in the end. The money was a factor but the bigger issue was the embryo damage risk. We had 5 frozen embryos left, here’s the message I got from the embryologist team when I asked about survival rates:

“The survival rate after freezing&thawing of the embryo is very high (95-98%). However, in order to biopsy the embryo which was frozen at blastocyst stage we need to thaw it and wait for it to re-expand in order to take a thophectoderm biopsy for PGTA. On avarage we see 85% rate of re-expansion. In summary, we hope for all 5 the embryos to survive and be suitable for biopsy (especially that grading of your embryos looks good) but please do factor in the risk of 1 of them not surviving/not being suitable.”

We also discussed potentially doing Karotype testing of myself and my partner to see if we carried anything unbeknownst to us that could be passed on to the embryos. Again we ended up not doing this but it’s another halfway house option that wouldn’t touch the embryos.

There’s definitely no right answer to this decision. So it is really is a personal one.

good luck either way!

We did - tested 6 and all 6 survived. I actually had my Dr call the head embryologist to ask when the last time they had lost an embryo to the process, and it had been years with zero issues which made me feel very relieved. Not sure if there's any way for you to also pose the question to the lab?

@Zypig Miscarriage from what was almost certainly a chromosomally abnormal embryo due to certain markers during the pregnancy.

What markers are those? I also had a miscarriage and would love to know if there was an abnormality or if something else caused it.

@BellaRosex
hi, we are getting our embryos PGT tested this cycle but didn’t before. We still have 2 frozen blasts from our last cycle (we are banking embryos hence this cycle) we were told we could PGT test the 2 prior frozen embryos along with any new ones we create this time but we were told that the thawing and re freezing of these already frozen blasts can reduce success rates of them by 20% .. due to them having to be thawed again at time of transfer (so they will be going through 2 thawing processes, and two freezing). We decided not to do this and just test the new ones we create. We had the karyotyping test which both came back fine.
I did however just have a biopsy of the endometrium and this came back postive for a bacterial infection in the uterus, hopefully after this clears with antibiotics, it could answer why we have had 6 miscarriages? I advise getting all the test they can give you and your partner as you never know what could be causing the issues.

@anymouseanon sorry to hear of your miscarriage. In our case it was measuring 6 days behind always and had a slower than average heart rate and the heart rate couldn’t be detected until 7 weeks. It being IVF with exact dates meant this looked abnormal. They told us that it was likely going to miscarry and it was probably an abnormal embryo. I had a missed miscarriage 10 days later. The only way to definitively know would be to test the pregnancy product but we didn’t see the point.

Hi Loulamay,

Thanks for responding. That's great that all of yours survived. Would you mind confirming which clinic it was done at?

Thanks

B x

Oh I'm sorry it was in Cape Town where we used to live! Not very helpful.

Have you decided on your next steps? x

@BellaRosex Hi we had 6 frozen embryos thawed and biopsied for PGT. They all survived the thaw to be biopsied. These were 6 remaining out of a batch of 10 "top quality" day 5 and 6 blastocysts. After we had two medicated FET and one natural double transfer all resulting in no implantation we opted for this as I couldn't go through more and more failed transfers with so many still to go at.

From the PGT only 2 out of the 6 came back euploid. For context I was only 31 when these embryos were created, partner 33 so the statistics did not match my age. 3 were completely incompatible with life and the other was a Turner syndrome mosaic, so some cells were missing a chromosone.

I am about to have a transfer in the next few weeks with hopefully one of the euploid embryos provided it can survive the re-thaw. For us it was worth the risk and the cost to avoid having another potentially 4 failed transfers with embryos that would not survive past transfer.

@BellaRosex Also to add, these embryos were from our NHS funded round and no suggestion of PGT was ever made presumably due to my age but going forwards if needed I would definitely do the PGT from fresh if I did another egg retrieval. When you've had 5 failed transfers there's only so much someone can take I'd like to at least know it has a chance.

@Nk11 sorry to hear you have had so much loss, wishing you all the best for your two euploid embryos. This seems like it was defo the best idea getting tested as you say to save you going through more loss.

Just waiting for the results of PGT-A and it is agonising...... we had one day 5 embryo and 3 day 6 embryos..... I am 42

Aww wishing you the best of luck! 🙏🏻 How long do you have to wait?

I've decided I'm going to go for testing myself, although my embryos are frozen so I'm a nervous wreck that it's going to damage them! 😩

Best of luck @MrsBowen - I’ll be doing the PGTA too if I ever get any blastocysts that is! I’ve just turned 41 so similar age to yourself. Keeping everything crossed for you x

UGH it's the worst every time my phone goes I jump! Anyone got any stats for me

I also am doing the testing and I am 41 .. EC is on Thursday so fingers crossed 🤞🏽 best of luck to you ladies

Would you mind me asking what clinic you are at?

I'm currently trying to decide which clinic to use. My current clinic doesn't offer PGT-A testing so I need to transfer them temporarily to another clinic. I'm looking at CRGH. Anyone have have experience there?

Best of luck for your egg collection @hopefullsosbry ! @MrsBowen I think for us who are around age 40 (I like to round down 😉) the percentage of euploid embryos is around 30%. But I’ve heard of people having most/all coming back euploid, so it really does seem to be down to luck and different for each individual. I’m just hoping for at least 3 embryos at the end, so I have some statistical hope of a euploid! Hope you hear from them soon- it’s horrible waiting on calls! X

@LimeBird fingers crossed for you, yeh I had in my head if we could at least get two euploid then we might even try one in a surrogate, just incase it’s my body , although we have had all the tests there might be something they are missing ? But surrogate is illegal I think in the uk and don’t even know how to go about it at all, 🤷🏼‍♀️has anyone ever thought about a surrogate or know of anything about this ??

@hopefullsosbry I know what you mean, I had a failed transfer in summer and wonder whether there’s something wrong in there. What tests have you had? I haven’t had any but considering paying for ERA but god it’s pricey!
I don’t know much about surrogacy but have heard of people using surrogates abroad where it is legal, there are companies that facilitate it and you pay them to arrange it etc. So it can be an option.

We went to The Evewell but it hasn't been great tbh- I think a lot of the stuff they post online seems great in theory but hasn't been our experience. Their head of embryology was quoting different stats online to those the lab gave us so that was pretty upsetting and the whole thing has really added to my anxiety just want it to be over! My friend says good things about Avenues the new one in Euston. I'm really pessimistic as we only have one day 5 blast- the rest are day 6 and Emma says they are a lot less likely to be normal.

@MrsBowen this may help put your anxiety at ease a bit , there is someone on another chat I am on and they send 6 blasts fir testing 2 x day 5 blasts and 4x day 6 blasts , 2 came back euploid .. it was one of each .. a day 5 and a day 6 .. so the 6 can be viable I guess.
@LimeBird I had the endometrial biopsy and they noticed a bacterial infection within the womb, I have had antibiotics for this so I hope this may change the outcome next time, also had all the standard tests from the NHS recurrent miscarriage clinic which involved genetic karyotype and others I can remember all, the only thing we didn’t check was Natural killer cells , there is conflicting evidence for this so we have not bothered to test for this?

Do you know how old they were?

@MrsBowen Age 39

I'm 42 and I think it goes down so much.....

So sorry to hear you’ve had recurrent losses @hopefullsosbry , really hope this cycle is the lucky one for you