• Question: if you fertilised two eggs during the treatment could you create twins? thanks for the live chat it was good. :)

    Asked by riya123 to Claire, Greg, Jane, Jo, Vicki on 22 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Jane Cleal

      Jane Cleal answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      Hi,
      Yes you could fertilise two eggs and put them in the mum. This would only create twins if both eggs attached to the womb and started to grow properly. This can happen quite alot in ivf, but doesn’t always happen.
      J x

    • Photo: Greg FitzHarris

      Greg FitzHarris answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      yes, thats absolutely what would happen. In the uk the law allows you tio put tw0 back into the woman in the hope that it doubles the chance of at least one implantingh and becoming a baby. Buyt, if both implant… yes, you get twins!

    • Photo: Claire O'Donnell

      Claire O'Donnell answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      Hi riya123, nice to see you again, the chat was fun wasn’t it? Yes you’re quite right there is a real risk of twins if two embryos are replaced especially in a younger woman. Twins are a dangerous option for both the mother and the babes. Twins are almost always born premature and prematuer babies tend to be smaller and premature twins smaller still.
      Nowadays there is a big move to only implant one good embryo that has a high chance of implanting and resulting in a pregnancy. you could read more about it on the HFEA web site. The initiative is called ‘One at a time’ and here’s the link
      http://www.oneatatime.org.uk/
      It can get a bit technical but the explation of the risks of twins is straighforward enough. Do you like the title? I worked on this and it took us ages to think of it:)

    • Photo: Vicki Onions

      Vicki Onions answered on 22 Jun 2010:

      If 2 eggs from the same woman were fertilised to produce 2 embryos and they were both replaced and both implanted, then yes, you would prodice non-identical twins!
      The wierd thing to think about is…..if 2 eggs from the same woman were fertilised to produce embryos – say one embryo was replaced and the others were frozen to use later. The first embryo replaced implanted and the woman gave birth. £ years later she comes back and thaws out one of her embryos and it is relpaced and implants and she gives birth again – is this a twin to the first child……? Answers on a postcard……
      And yes, the chat was great fun – thanks for the great Q’s!

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