Empire States Blog

DUTCH IVF CENTRE PROBES SUSPECTED SPERM MIX UP 

A Dutch IVF treatment centre has said that 26 women may have been fertilised by sperm from the wrong man.

                                 

The Utrecht University Medical Centre said a "procedural error" between April 2015 and November 2016 was to blame.

Half of the couples who underwent treatment are pregnant or have already had children. They have been informed, the medical centre said.

     

The technique at the centre of the mistake involved a single sperm being injected directly into a woman's egg with a pipette. It is called Intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and differs from in vitro fertilisation.

From April 2015 to November 2016, one of the lab technicians is believed to have used an inappropriate pipette to inject the sperm.

Although the pipette was changed each time, the technician used the same rubber top until he found traces of sperm in it and raised the alarm. The rubber top would normally have a filter, but in this case it did not, a hospital spokesman told the BBC.

Of the 26 couples involved, nine have had children and four women are pregnant. The other 13 embryos were all frozen.

     

• Tweet
• Share
• Share
• Share
• Share