Publications by authors named "Christopher N Herndon"

Here, we report on a rare case of a live birth following assisted oocyte activation of failed fertilized oocytes. A 34-year-old nulliparous woman presenting at a university-based assisted reproductive technology center with multi-factor infertility underwent an IVF cycle using intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) of frozen/thawed testicular sperm aspiration (TESA) sample and preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A). All oocytes displayed failed fertilization at assessment 18 h post-ICSI.

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Objective: To report 2 cases of adverse pregnancy outcomes due to delayed diagnosis of urogenital tuberculosis and propose a screening algorithm for patients from tuberculosis-endemic countries.

Design: Case report.

Setting: Academic medical center.

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Objective: To survey practice patterns designed to increase access to infertility care and evaluate the exposure of obstetrics and gynecology residents to infertility care for the underserved.

Design: Cross-sectional.

Setting: Reproductive endocrinology and infertility (REI) practices associated with Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education-accredited obstetrics and gynecology residency training programs.

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Objective: To provide a review of the current literature surrounding barriers to reproductive medicine and present examples of how resident and fellow education can be used to overcome these barriers.

Design: A review of the relevant literature addressing barriers to reproductive medicine, resident and fellow education, and related materials was completed.

Setting: Academic medical institutions.

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Objective: To assess attitudes and factors that influence public opinion in the general US population toward insurance coverage and provision of infertility care to lower income patients.

Design: Cross-sectional survey.

Setting: Online.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates how satellite clinics in assisted reproductive technology (ART) influence access to care for reproductive-age women in the US, highlighting a need to understand their impact on geographic barriers.
  • Researchers found that out of the reproductive-age population, about 72% have access to a main ART clinic, while 8% have access only to satellite clinics, and 20% have no access to any ART clinics.
  • The results indicate that satellite clinics tend to be located closer to other main clinics than their own, suggesting a potential redundancy in access rather than expanding service reach.
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Given the concurrence of medical residency and fellowship training with typical childbearing years, trainees often must make difficult decisions regarding family planning, requiring the support of their residency and fellowship program directors (PDs) to guide them. Our hypothesis was that PDs have knowledge gaps and varying levels of support in terms of their trainees' fertility, and the goal of our study was to assess the knowledge and support of residency and fellowship PDs in the United States toward trainees' reproductive needs. Cross-sectional survey distributed to all residency and fellowship PDs providing contact information through the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education website in August 2019.

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Article Synopsis
  • This study reports three cases of severe ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS) in oncofertility patients who received a long-acting GnRH agonist after controlled ovarian hyperstimulation (COH) and embryo freezing.! -
  • All three patients developed serious symptoms, including ascites and hyponatremia, indicative of severe early-onset OHSS despite using a GnRH agonist trigger to minimize risks.! -
  • The findings suggest that using a long-acting GnRH agonist right after oocyte retrieval may heighten the risk of severe OHSS, prompting a recommendation to delay its initiation for high-risk patients.!
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Background: Few studies have examined health literacy and fertility knowledge among women from low income, socio-culturally diverse communities presenting for fertility care in the United States. Our study sought to examine demographic predictors of fertility-related knowledge among infertile women from low and high-resource communities in two major metropolitan centers in the United States.

Methods: Fertility Knowledge Assessments were administered to women presenting for fertility care at county medical centers serving low-resource, largely immigrant patients and to women from largely affluent populations presenting to comprehensive fertility centers in two cities.

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Background: Infertility is a prevalent disease of reproductive health that exerts an impact on an estimated 80 million people worldwide. For many, involuntary childlessness becomes a central and preoccupying issue in their lives, the impact of which is exacerbated by lack of access to basic care and treatment. These effects maybe further magnified among immigrant communities, a growing but highly marginalized population that has been shown in other areas of reproductive health to experience worse health outcomes and delays in access to care.

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Objective: To report on outcomes from a university-based low-cost and low-complexity IVF program using mild stimulation approaches and simplified protocols to provide basic access to ART to a socioculturally diverse low-income urban population.

Design: Retrospective cohort study.

Setting: Academic infertility center.

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Infertility is a common reproductive disease, with a prevalence of 9% to 18% of the general population. To date, no studies have attempted to examine the prevalence and experience of infertility among resident physicians in the United States. In female obstetrics and gynecology (Ob/Gyn) residents of age where infertility becomes more prevalent, ability to seek fertility may be influenced by rigorous professional demands and low remuneration.

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Objective: Adenomyosis is a clinical disorder defined by the presence of endometrial glands and stroma within the myometrium, the pathogenesis of which is poorly understood. We postulate that dysregulation of genes and pathways in eutopic endometrium may predispose to ectopic implantation. No study, to our knowledge, has examined the global transcriptome of isolated eutopic endometrium from women with clinically significant adenomyosis.

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Background: Gynecomastia is a disorder of the endocrine system characterized by an abnormal presence of a palpable unilateral or bilateral enlargement and proliferation of glandular ductal benign breast tissue in male individuals. This case discusses the medical implications of an unregulated, indirect exposure to nonformulary, bioidentical hormone replacement therapy in male children.

Case: An 8-year-old boy presented with prepubertal gynecomastia secondary to estrogen exposure from maternal use of bioidentical hormonal replacement therapy (the Wiley protocol).

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Purpose: The purpose of this study is to present a case of healthy infant born after intracytoplasmic sperm injection-in vitro fertilization (ICSI-IVF) with preimplantation genetic screening (PGS) using sperm from a man with non-mosaic trisomy 21 and a literature review.

Materials And Methods: A 26-year-old euploid female and 29-year-old male with non-mosaic trisomy 21 and male factor undergoing ICSI-IVF treatment for primary infertility with embryo biopsy for PGS with comprehensive chromosomal screening (CCS) presented to the Infertility Clinic at Highland Hospital, the Alameda County Medical Center, California, with 6-year history of primary infertility. The outcome measure is a live birth of a healthy child and ploidy status of biopsied blastocysts.

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In this report, we describe abrupt onset of secondary amenorrhea in a woman with history of chronic systemic sarcoidosis. Endocrinologic evaluation of her hypothalamic-pituitary axis revealed abnormally low levels of follicle-stimulating hormone, luteinizing hormone, and insulinlike growth factor 1 and elevated prolactin. Urine osmolality was low, and serum osmolality was high.

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Purpose: To determine the vaginal microbiome in women undergoing IVF-ET and investigate correlations with clinical outcomes.

Methods: Thirty patients had blood drawn for estradiol (E(2)) and progesterone (P(4)) at four time points during the IVF-ET cycle and at 4-6 weeks of gestation, if pregnant. Vaginal swabs were obtained in different hormonal milieu, and the vaginal microbiome determined by deep sequencing of the 16S ribosomal RNA gene.

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Unlabelled: The diagnostic criteria and clinical relevance of the arcuate uterine anomaly have long been debated. Our review critically examines the contemporary and past literature regarding the definition, prevalence, and clinical impact of the arcuate uterine anomaly on reproductive outcomes. To bring a novel perspective to the debate, we examined studies evaluating the clinical significance of the presence of a residual septal stump following surgical resection, which has morphology comparable to that of the arcuate anomaly.

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Obstructed hemivagina and ipsilateral renal anomaly (OHVIRA) syndrome is a rare complex of structural abnormalities of the female urogenital tract. A 17-year-old girl with uterine didelphys associated with OHVIRA syndrome presented with progressive development of cyclic lower abdominal discomfort and a large abdominopelvic mass. We describe the findings from ultrasound, computed tomography (CT), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), the first case report of this syndrome to examine all three different imaging modalities in a single patient.

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Background: The extensive medicinal plant knowledge of Amazonian tribal peoples is widely recognized in the scientific literature and celebrated in popular lore. Despite this broad interest, the ethnomedical systems and knowledge of disease which guide indigenous utilization of botanical diversity for healing remain poorly characterized and understood. No study, to our knowledge, has attempted to directly examine patterns of actual disease recognition and treatment by healers of an Amazonian indigenous culture.

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Although intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) generally is considered a safe treatment for various autoimmune and inflammatory disorders, rare cases of thrombosis may occur. We describe two patients who experienced thrombotic complications associated with IVIg therapy. A 54-year-old woman with idiopathic thrombocytopenia received IVIg 1 g/kg/day for 2 days.

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