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Insights from clinical experience in treating IVF poor responders
‘Poor responders’ is a term used to describe a subpopulation of IVF patients who do not respond well to ovarian stimulation with gonadotrophins. While there is no standard definition of a poor responder, these patients tend to be of advanced maternal age (≥40 years), have a history of poor ovarian response with conventional stimulation protocols, and/or have low ovarian reserve. Despite the heterogeneity of this patient group, there are characteristics and needs common to many poor responders that can be addressed through a holistic approach.Ovarian reserve screening before contraception?
Women are increasingly delaying conception to later years. Hormonal contraception induces artificial cyclicity, which does not, like natural cyclicity, reflect normal, physiological ovarian behaviour. Therefore, long-term users of hormonal contraceptives, in particular, fail to derive potential diagnostic benefits from changes in menstrual cyclicity, which usually alerts patients and physicians to developing ovarian pathology. Timely diagnosis of ovarian problems is further hampered, as anti-Müllerian hormone is suppressed by hormonal contraceptives, making the accurate assessment of functional ovarian reserve more difficult.
