Bangladesh News

The couple had all the sun yesterday when they heard the cry of their newborn Apsora, the first ever success in frozen embryo implantation in Bangladesh.

“She is doing great, she is in good health, she has no physical defect, nor does she need any special care,” Rashida Begum, the doctor behind the groundbreaking success in Bangladesh, told The Daily Star.

Now in a ward of Anwar Khan Modern Hospital in Dhanmondi, the baby girl, weighing 3.2 kg at birth, will soon go home, doctors expect.

“It can’t be described how happy the couple is. They had been waiting for a baby for long five years. It is really thrilling to see such a success,” said Rashida, an assistant professor of the gynaecology and obstetrics department of Dhaka Medical College Hospital.The landmark success came 24 years after the first frozen embryo baby was born in Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital in Melbourne, Australia.

The technology is similar to ‘in vitro fertilisation’, a process by which egg cells are fertilised by sperm outside the woman’s womb in an artificial environment. The process involves hormonally controlling the ovulation process, removing ova (eggs) from the woman’s ovaries and letting sperm fertilise them in a fluid medium. The fertilised egg (zygote) is then transferred to the patient’s uterus for a successful pregnancy.

Married five years ago, Afzal-Salma couple decided to have a test tube baby as they failed to have a baby in three and a half years of their marriage.

Then they started treatment for infertility and decided to go for a test tube baby.

In their first attempt to having a test tube baby, 14 embryos were born to the couple. On September 19 last year, three embryos were transferred to the uterus of Salma. But the attempt turned a failure.

The remaining 11 embryos were kept frozen and preserved in a nitrogen can at a temperature of minus 196 degree centigrade in Infertility Care and Research Centre (ICRC) in Dhaka for four months.

“On January 18 this year, we placed four embryos in Salma’s uterus. And this time we are successful,” Dr Rashida said.

She saw success in her sixth attempt. Of the previous five, three attempts resulted in blighted ovum, a pregnancy which in the very early stage appears normal in an ultrasound scan but the embryo never develops, and in the other two ended in abortions.

“The couple was a little bit nervous as there was no record of success in frozen embryo transfer in Bangladesh. Salma remained highly cautious since her pregnancy, although no complexity arose during the whole process,” said Dr Rashida.

Starting at 2:00pm, the operation at Anwar Khan Modern Hospital took 20 minutes.

Dr Shaheena Begum, Farzana Khan, Nusrat, Ehsan Quader and Nafisa assisted Dr Rashida during the operation.

The couple had to spend Tk 2 lakh for the entire fertilisation process while they needed Tk 35,000 for transfer of embryos and another 30,000 for preserving the embryos, Dr Rashida said.

“Preserving the surplus embryos in such a way saves a huge amount of money of couples facing difficulties in getting pregnant. Frozen embryos can be preserved for years before using for further attempts,” Dr Rashida said.

Doctors said the longest record of preserving a frozen embryo is 13 years.

After the first ever birth of a baby from a frozen embryo in Australia in 1984, the first such baby in Asia was born in National University Hospital in Singapore three years later.