Press releases


29th December 2000
Singapore’s First Births from Frozen Eggs and Frozen Testicular Sperm

Chief Scientist Dr Chia Choy May, with her team at the Thomson Fertility Clinic, Thomson Medical Centre and Dr Cathryn Dr Chan Weng Buen succeeded in achieving a successful pregnancy from frozen eggs and frozen sperm. This is believed to be the first births in the medical fraternity worldwide.

The recent breakthrough is unique on two counts. First, it is the first time, worldwide, that a pregnancy was achieved from both a frozen egg and a frozen sperm. Second, the survival of frozen eggs is extremely difficult to achieve. So far, only about 30 births from frozen eggs were recorded worldwide but none from frozen eggs and frozen sperm.

Dr Chia explained: “The couple that came for the fertility treatment had a more complicated health history than usual. The husband had no sperm in the ejaculate so we had to extract the sperm from the testes. The extracted sperm was frozen in preparation for an IVF/ICSI cycle.”

“His wife went through IVF and she had over 30 eggs at egg collection. Only 8 eggs were injected while the remaining eggs were frozen to prevent aging. Due to the patient’s hyperstimulated condition, no embryo transfer was attempted.”

“Five months later, the patient returned for a thaw cycle in which the frozen/thawed eggs were subjected to ICSI (intracytoplasmic sperm injection) with the thawed testicular sperm. Although the patient did fall pregnant, unfortunately, it ended in a miscarriage.”

“The patient returned for the second thaw cycle 6 months later. 80% of the remaining 12 frozen eggs survived. Two embryos resulting from ICSI of the frozen/thawed testicular sperm into the frozen/thawed eggs were transferred and culminated in the birth of a pair of healthy twins recently. The twins were of a good weight (over 2kg) and were successfully delivered by Caesarean section.”

Said Thomson Medical Centre’s Chief Executive Officer Mr Leong Yew Meng: “We are making constant breakthroughs at Thomson Fertility Clinic so as to offer hope and the best fertility solutions to couples who need help and intervention in conceiving. We are equally committed to giving our best efforts to support the government's fertility policy by searching out new techniques to help more couples conceive.”

“Our numerous ‘firsts’ are the results of a team of highly competent and committed staff. Each new ‘miracle birth’ will bring us a step closer to fulfilling the hopes of couples to have their own children, especially those couples who have more complex health histories as in this particular case. And the parents’ celebration of these new lives is the best reward for Thomson Medical Centre and for our dedicated team at Thomson Fertility Clinic.”

“Thomson Fertility Clinic (TFC) will continue to compete for the best talents to strengthen its present team. The Clinic plans to do so by recruiting some of the leading IVF clinician specialists and scientists in the next few months.”