• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2017

The task force of the Korean Society for Reproductive Immunology recommends intravenous immunoglobulin G treatment in women with reproductive failure, including recurrent pregnancy loss and/or repeated implantation failure, who show cellular immune factors such as abnormal natural killer cell levels, natural killer cell cytotoxicity, and/or type 1 T helper immunity.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.95-99
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• 1997

Irreparable obstructive azoospermic patients can be treated successfully with microsurgical epididymal sperm aspiration(MESA) or testicular sperm extraction (TESE) by intracytoplasmic sperm injection(ICSI). Obstructive azoospermic patients generally have normal spermatogenesis. The aim of this study was to see if any spermatozoa could be retrieved from non-obstructive azoospermia and to assess the efficacy of ICSI with TESE in germinal failure. 42 non-obstructive azoospermic patients revealed no spermatozoa at all in their ejaculates, even after centrifuge. The histology of 42 patients revealed 15 Sertoli cell only Syndrome, 4 maturation arrest and 23 severe hypospermatogenesis. All patients underwent extensive multiple testicular biopsy for sperm retrieval. These patients were scheduled for ICSI using testicular spermatozoa. In 25 out of 42 non-obstructive azoospermic patients, spermatozoa were recovered from multiple testicular biopsy specimen and 11 ongoing pregnancies were achieved. There are usually some tiny foci of spermatogenesis which allow TESE with ICSI in non-obstructive azoospermia. Also these patients may have sufficient sperm in the testes for ICSI, despite extremely high FSH level and small testes.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.52 no.6
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• pp.582-597
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• 2022

Purpose: This study aimed to translate the Infertility Stigma Scale (ISS) into Korean and to evaluate its reliability and validity in the Korean context. Methods: Data were collected from 350 women who underwent in vitro fertilization (IVF). Data were analyzed using SPSS WIN 25.0 and AMOS 22.0. Content validity was analyzed using the item-level content validity index (I-CVI) and scale-level content validity index/averaging (S-CVI/Ave). The preliminary survey was conducted on 20 women who had experienced IVF at least once to check the level of understanding of the tool and the time required to fill out the questionnaire. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to test construct validity. Additionally, hypothesis-testing construct validity were tested. Cronbach's α was used to assess the reliability. Results: The Korean-ISS (K-ISS) consists of 25 items, excluding two items from the original ISS questionnaire. Exploratory factor analysis identified four factors, which explained 75.6% of the total variance. The four distinct factors were infertility stigma with self-devaluation (56.8%), public stigma (8.1%), social withdrawal (6.5%), and family stigma (4.2%). In the confirmatory factor analysis, the 25 items in the four-factor structure were validated (χ² /df ≤ 3, RMSEA ≤ 10). The hypothesis-testing construct validity of K-ISS against FPI (r = .58~.71, p < .001) and FQI (r = - .49~- .65, p < .001) was tested and found to be significant. The internal consistency reliability of the K-ISS, assessed using Cronbach's α, was .97. Conclusion: The K-ISS has satisfactory construct validity and reliability; therefore, it can help minimize the negative impact of stigma by measuring the stigma associated with women experiencing infertility.

• 대한생식의학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.161.2-161.2
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• 2006

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.305-312
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• 2007

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy of split insemination method in treatments for non-male factor infertility. Method: Laboratory and clinical data were collected from 505 cycles of split insemination during 2002$\sim$2005 in our center. The subjects were non-male factor infertility such as endometriosis, tubal, uterine, PCOS and idiopathic infertility without any sperm defects. Retrieved oocytes were randomly divided, and inseminated by conventional IVF or ICSI. Fertilized zygotes were cultured for 2$\sim$5 days to ET date, and surplus zygotes and embryos were frozen for subsequent frozen-thawed ET cycles. Clinical outcomes according to insemination method were compared by statistical analysis. Results: The overall fertilization per retrieved oocytes was significantly higher in ICSI than that of conventional IVF in sibling oocytes (62.5$\pm$22.3% vs 52.9$\pm$28.0%, p<0.01). Total fertilization failure occurred only in 2 of 505 cycles (0.4%) in split insemination cycles. Incidence of fertilization failure and poor fertilization rate less than 30% by ICSI were significantly lower than those of conventional IVF (1.1% and 7.5% vs 8.5% and 22.0%, p<0.01). Delivery rates after transfer of fresh and thawed embryos from split insemination cycles were 40.0% (185/462) and 35.0% (55/157), respectively. There was no significant difference in the implantation and delivery rates of ET with embryos from conventional IVF or ICSI. Conclusion: Taken together, the split insemination method improves poor fertilization rates resulting in successful clinical outcomes and thus could be used for non-male factor infertile couples in human ART program.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Toxicology Conference
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• 2003.10b
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• pp.122-122
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• 2003

Endometrial tissue is an interesting model for intrinsic and extrinsic factors, ie hormones and growth factors, involved in its normal pathologic development and its cyclic growth. The endometrial cells were isolated from endometrial tissue of the proliferative phase obtained by hysterectomy and separated stromal and epithelial cells.(omitted)

• Women's Health Nursing
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.273-284
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• 2019

Purpose: As the number of infertile couples has grown, many infertile women have experienced depression during the diagnosis and treatment of their infertility. This study aimed to identify the factors related to depression in infertile women who underwent reproductive treatments. Methods: The study subjects were 149 infertile women who underwent reproductive treatments. The data were collected by self-administered questionnaires from August 1 to December 24, 2018. The questionnaire consisted of questions about fatigue, health-promoting behavior, and depression. Analyses of the descriptive statistics, t-tests, one-way analysis of variance, correlation, and multiple regression were conducted using the SPSS 25.0 Windows program. Results: Thirty-six of the women in the study (24.2%) were in the probably depressed group and 113 (75.8%) were in the definitely depressed group and 100% of the subjects experienced symptoms of depression. Depression was positively correlated with fatigue and negatively correlated with health-promoting behavior. Multiple regression analysis revealed that fatigue and interpersonal relationships were factors significantly related to depression in the model (p<.001), with an explanatory power of 42.6%. Conclusion: The results confirmed that fatigue and interpersonal relationships, which is a subfactor of health-promoting behavior, were factors related to depression. To alleviate depression in infertile women, efforts should be made to identify and reduce psychological and physical fatigue. In addition, minimizing relational difficulties that they experience during an infertility diagnosis and treatment and strengthening positive interpersonal relationships can be positive strategies to alleviate depression.

• Development and Reproduction
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.133-140
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• 2013

This study was performed to investigate the expression of cathepsin B mRNA and protein in eutopic and ectopic endometrial tissues of patients with endometriosis and in normal endometrial tissues and to clarify the association between the cathepsin B expression and endometriosis. A total of 40 women with histologically confirmed endometriosis were recruited for study group. For controls, 20 women undergoing operative treatment for uterine myoma, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) or benign gynecologic conditions other than endometriosis were recruited. Eutopic endometrial tissues of both groups and ectopic endometrial tissue of study group were collected during the operations. We employed real time reverse transcriptase - polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) to quantify mRNA levels of cathepsin B in these tissues. Then, we performed western blot analysis to measure the protein levels of cathepsin B. The expressions of cathepsin B mRNA and protein were significantly higher in both eutopic and ectopic endometrial tissues of women with endometriosis than in endometrial tissues of controls. These data suggest that the higher expression of cathepsin B in the endometrial tissues might be associated with the development of endometriosis. In addition, eutopic endometrium itself with higher expression cathepsin B may play a pivotal role in the histogenesis of endometriosis.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.141-145
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• 2001

Objective: We inversigated Small Heterodimer Partner (SHP) gene mutation in Korean Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) patients. SHP protein regulates the activity of nuclear receptors which regulate the cellular development and differentiation. Recently, the mutation of SHP gene was found in the obesity and diabetes patients in Japanese group, and suggested that its mutation may involved in pathogenic mechanism of PCOS. Methods: This study was performed in 20 PCOS patients and 20 normal women. The DNAs were extracted from the peripheral bloods, and amplified at each exon (1 and 2) of SHP gene by PCR method. Subsequently, each PCR product was digested with the restriction enzyme indicated below for studying restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP). After enzyme digestion, the results of RFLP were compared PCOS patients with control women to find any sequence variation. Results: We examined 9 regions of exon 1 with Msp I, Pvu II, Dde I and 3 regions of exon 2 with Pst I, Dde I. There is no heterozygous or homozygous mutation in patients and control women at these restriction sites. Conclusion: The genetic analysis at our restriction sites in the SHP gene did not show any genetic variation in Korean PCOS patients. Our PCR-RFLP analysis was not covered the entire SHP gene (68 bp/1,006 bp), we need to further analysis of the entire SHP gene.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.49-56
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• 2010

Objective: To investigate assisted reproductive technology (ART) outcomes in women with WHO class I anovulation compared with control group. Design: Retrospective case-control study. Methods: Twenty-three infertile women with hypogonadotropic hypogonadism (H-H) who undertook ART procedure from August 2003 to January 2009 were enrolled in this study. A total of 59 cycles (H-H group) were included; Intra-uterine insemination with super-ovulation (SO-IUI, 32 cycles), in vitro fertilization with fresh embryo transfer (IVF-ET, 18 cycles) and subsequent frozenthawed embryo transfer (FET, 9 cycles). Age and BMI matched 146 cycles of infertile women were collected as control group; 64 cycles of unexplained infertile women for SO-IUI and 54 cycles of IVF-ET and 28 cycles of FET with tubal factor. We compared ART and pregnancy outcomes such as clinical pregnancy rate (CPR), clinical abortion rate (CAR), and live birth rate (LBR) between the two groups. Results: There was no difference in the mean age ($32.7{\pm}3.3$ vs. $32.6{\pm}2.7$ yrs) and BMI ($21.0{\pm}3.1$ vs. $20.8{\pm}3.1kg/m^2$) between two groups. Mean levels of basal LH, FSH, and $E_2$ in H-H group were $0.62{\pm}0.35$ mIU/ml, $2.60{\pm}2.30$ mIU/ml and $10.1{\pm}8.2$ pg/ml, respectively. For ovarian stimulation, H-H group needed higher total amount of gonadotropin injected and longer duration for ovarian stimulation (p<0.001). In SO-IUI cycles, there was no significant difference of CPR, CAR, and LBR between the two groups. In IVF-ET treatment, H-H group presented higher mean $E_2$ level on hCG day ($3104.8{\pm}1020.2$ pg/ml vs. $1878.3{\pm}1197.7$ pg/ml, p<0.001) with lower CPR (16.7 vs. 37.0%, p=0.11) and LBR (5.6 vs. 33.3%, p=0.02) and higher CAR (66.7 vs. 10.0%, p=0.02) compared with the control group. However, subsequent FET cycles showed no significant difference of CPR, CAR, and LBR between the two groups. Conclusion: H-H patients need higher dosage of gonadotropin and longer duration for ovarian stimulation compared with the control groups. Significantly poor pregnancy outcomes in IVF-ET cycles of H-H group may be due to detrimental endometrial factors caused by higher $E_2$ level and the absence of previous hormonal exposure on endometrium.