Cancer, Fertility and Me: Developing and Testing a Novel Fertility Preservation Patient Decision Aid to Support Women at Risk of Losing Their Fertility Because of Cancer Treatment.

Background: Women with a new cancer diagnosis face complex decisions about interventions aiming to preserve their fertility. Decision aids are more effective in supporting decision making than traditional information provision. We describe the development and field testing of a novel patient decision aid designed to support women to make fertility preservation treatment decisions around cancer diagnosis.

Outcomes of delivering a fertility preservation service for women with cancer over a 12-year period at a UK assisted conception unit.

This service evaluation aimed to appraise the delivery of a fertility preservation service for women with cancer which was established in 2005 as part of an Assisted Conception Unit. First, the ACU-database was interrogated between 08/2005 and 01/2017; revealing 174 women received referrals over the 12-year period with a steady referral increase each year. Demographic analyses revealed factors, such as being partnered, to be strong indicators of whether women would seek FP or not.

Preserving fertility in women with cancer (PreFer): Decision-making and patient-reported outcomes in women offered egg and embryo freezing prior to cancer treatment.

Objective: Women of childbearing age with new cancer diagnoses have to make rapid decisions about fertility preservation (FP) before starting cancer treatment (CT). The aim of the PreFer study was to explore this FP decision-making process and its impact on patient-reported outcomes (PROMs) and health-related quality of life (HRQoL).

Methods: A prospective, mixed-methods design was used (questionnaires, in-depth interviews).

Induced endometrial trauma (endometrial scratch) in the mid-luteal menstrual cycle phase preceding first cycle IVF/ICSI versus usual IVF/ICSI therapy: study protocol for a randomised controlled trial.

Introduction: Endometrial trauma commonly known as endometrial scratch (ES) has been shown to improve pregnancy rates in women with a history of repeated implantation failure undergoing in vitro fertilisation (IVF), with or without intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). However, the procedure has not yet been fully explored in women having IVF/ICSI for the first time. This study aims to examine the effect of performing an ES in the mid-luteal phase prior to a first-time IVF/ICSI cycle on the chances of achieving a clinical pregnancy and live birth.

What factors hinder the decision-making process for women with cancer and contemplating fertility preservation treatment?

Background: Although fertility preservation (FP) treatment options have increased, the existing evidence suggests that many women with cancer do not feel well supported in making these decisions, but find them stressful and complex and fail to take up fertility care at this crucial time. Whilst existing reviews have all made important contributions to our understanding of the FP decision-making process, none of them examine solely and specifically these processes for women of reproductive age with a diagnosis of any cancer, leaving a gap in the knowledge base. Given the expectation that care is patient-centred, our review aims to address this gap which may be of help to those managing patients struggling to make difficult decisions in the often brief period before potentially sterilizing cancer treatment is started.

A prospective randomized controlled trial of Wallace and Rocket embryo transfer catheters.

The aim of this study was to compare the efficacy of two embryo transfer catheters: Wallace and Rocket Embryon in an IVF programme of a tertiary referral university centre. A total of 308 patients undergoing embryo transfer were prospectively randomized to either a transfer with the Wallace catheter or a transfer with the Rocket catheter. The main outcome measure in this study was the clinical pregnancy rate, and secondary outcome measures included implantation rate, visibility of the catheter under ultrasound, number of retained embryos post transfer, and whether change of catheter was required.