Six babies conceived through in-vitro fertilisation and embryo transfer (IVF-ET) have been born in Kumasi, unlocking three post-menopausal women of barrenness.
The Trustcare Specialist Hospital & Fertility Centre in Kumasi carried out the in-vitro (‘outside the body’) fertilisation that combines the egg and sperm in an artificial environment, creating an embryo that is implanted in a host that carries it to full term.
One of the women, a 54-year-old resident of Kumasi, was delivered of a set of twins, both boys, after a first IVF-ET attempt at the fertility centre.
According to her, she has been married for the past 20 years and unable to get pregnant until she was subjected to the in-vitro fertilisation process.
Her counterpart from Sunyani, 55, gave birth to twin girls at her first attempt with the IVF-ET, while the third woman from Obuasi also delivered twin girls.
Both women have been married for 25 and 30 years respectively, with the Obuasi-based woman experiencing miscarriage once within the first year of marriage.
Procedure
Isaac Kofi Adu, a clinical embryologist, said the IVF is a specialised process in medicine that is used to help couples who, for various reasons, cannot get pregnant naturally.
According to him, the service was first introduced in Ghana at a private specialist hospital in Tema in 1990, and it had gained acceptance since.
He told DAILY GUIDE the Trustcare Hospital & Fertility Centre was established in 2011 and had assisted many childless mothers to have their own biological children.
Mr Adu was upbeat about the high success rate of the process, and pledged the hospital’s commitment to make the facility the first port of call for childless women.
He was, however, worried the constant increases in the prices of drugs for the fertility process and called for government’s intervention to make the service affordable to women in need of children.
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