How many embryos are usually genetically normal?

[LJT22]

Hi all 👋🏼

Hoping some of you lovely ladies may be able to help on this since the internet is just a mass of different views and stats!

Im 33 and we were so lucky to do an IVF cycle in 2020 which gave us 6 x 6AA blastocysts (5 day) our first fresh cycle failed, second FET gave us our beautiful son and we had another failed FET in January. About to go in for another transfer this Wednesday and getting nervous but I’m wondering does anyone know what the norm is for how many embryos would be genetically normal out of a batch of 6 high grade ones? I didn’t expect all of them to work but getting anxious thinking about the remaining 3 and wondering should we PGS test.

I know a girl who has had 2 transfers and both were successful so wondering is she just super lucky or have I been unlucky?

Any advice would be very welcome!

Thanks 🙏🏼

[KiboXX]

Hey lovely,

I honestly don’t think there is an answer to this as it really can vary cycle to cycle. The fact you have three embryos left I think gives you a really good chance of a sibling but with IVF I think it really is just a roll of the dice every time.

I’ve had four fresh cycles, the first one ended in an early miscarriage, the next two were negatives with nothing to freeze. Our fourth cycle we decided to do extra tests, including PGS testing and all three of our embryos from that round came back normal (I was 34 at the time). The first is my now 17 month old daughter, I’m currently 32 weeks pregnant with the second one and we have one left in the freezer. We transferred 7 embryos before one stuck and then were extremely lucky the next one after stuck as well.

I do think it’s hard when you know someone who has been very lucky to have it work first time, twice in a row but please don’t think you’re not normal as that rarely happens xx

[McQueeny]

I agree it’s really hard to answer that, and even though a normal embryo is a massive part of success it’s not the only factor. I know plenty of people who PGS tested their embryos and still they didn’t implant - there’s just loads we still don’t know….

I’ve been told ‘at your age up to 70-80% could be abnormal’ - that’s because I’m 39 and hubby is 53 (don’t forget male factor equally important). But it can fluctuate so much. We’ve never PGS tested our embryos - we’ve had 7 transfer so far, started when I was 35 , our third transfer gave us our little boy who’s now 2.5yrs and I’ve just got a BFP for transfer no. 7 and hoping for the best! 🤞🍀

I think that lady was super lucky ☺️ x

[Millbanks]

Hi lovely, I agree with the others as it's a bit of a minefield.

When I had my last egg collection at 38, I was told that 20 - 30% were likely to be normal.

We PGS tested as we had 9 embryos - and from that number (we only tested 8 because one didn't thaw properly) 6 were normal.

So what I'm saying is that although there are average percentages - there is no fixed science on this.

We were incredibly lucky to have such a high number of normal embryos at my age - but that alone wasn't enough to get it to stick and we still needed steroids to lower my immunity.

Best of luck xx

[sunset212]

Hi LJT22, how did you get on with your transfer? I hope it was successful? I think as you are a good responder producing lots of blasts its good that you know you have more to play with. I hope you got your BFP xx