Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI) is a laboratory procedure to help infertile couples undergoing IVF due to male factor infertility. It is a form of micromanipulation that involves the injection of a single sperm directly into the cytoplasm of a mature egg (oocyte) using a glass needle (pipette). If there is any problem with a sperm's ability to fertilize the egg (either due to low sperm count or poor sperm quality) ICSI is the most common and accurate method for solving it. Our colleagues were part of the original Belgian team that developed ICSI, and who first introduced it in the U.S. Eggs are retrieved in the same way as if you were doing conventional IVF, however, the eggs and the sperm are then fertilized in the laboratory, by direct injection of a single sperm into each egg. Two to five days later the resulting embryos are placed into your uterus (without surgery), just as with IVF procedures and any other embryos can be frozen for later using our method of vitrification.

The availability of ICSI has made it possible for men who previously would have been thought of as impotent because their sperm were too weak or too few to impregnate their wives in vitro. The fertilization rate per egg using ICSI is about 70% even in for very unhealthy sperm samples. The fertilization rate per infertile couple is over 99% when the wife has adequate eggs, and the pregnancy rate per treatment cycle is over 50%. This is no different from regular IVF with normal sperm. This technique is very cost-effective, and will give you the same high chance for getting pregnant as any couple with normal sperm. In fact, we perform ICSI at no extra charge for all of our IVF cycles to obtain better fertilization rates and better results even when the husband's sperm count is not impaired. Often, a single, almost non-moving sperm (appearing to be dead) can be retrieved and injected into a woman's egg, developing into a healthy embryo and a completely normal baby. So far, over 100,000 babies have been born with this new technique, and the babies have grown up to be physically, mentally, and genetically normal, no matter how poor original sperm samples were.

Even in cases where there is absolutely no sperm in the ejaculate, we can perform a testicle biopsy, remove a few non-moving sperm and, using a highly refined ultra micropipette, inject it into an egg for successful ICSI.