SUCCESSFUL GLUCOCORTICOID TREATMENT FOR PATIENTS WITH ABNORMAL AUTOIMMUNITY ON IN-VITRO FERTILIZATION AND EMBRYO-TRANSFER

Purpose: To analyze the effects of glucocorticoid treatment for patien ts with abnormal autoimmunity on IVF-ET outcomes, low-dose predonisolo ne or dexamethasone was administered in 51 IVF-ET cycles of 41 patient s with positive antinuclear antibody (ANA) anti-DNA antibody, and/or l upus anticoagulant (LAC). Rates of clinical pregnancy and implantation in these patients were compared with those in 48 cycles without corti costeroid therapy Autoantibody-negative patients were also treated wit h IVF-ET combined with (29 cycles) or without (57 cycles) glucocortico id administration, and the pregnancy and implantation rates were inves tigated. Results: without glucocorticoid treatment, the pregnancy rare per cycle and implantation rate per embryo in antibody-positive patie nts were 10.4 and 3.8%, respectively. Significant increases in pregnan cy (35.3%) and implantation (13.2%) rates were observed with corticost eroid treatment. In antibody-negative patients, the rates of pregnancy and implantation shelved no significant differences with versus witho ut the glucocorticoid administration. Conclusions: Our results indicat e that because autoimmune abnormalities may be at least one cause of i mplantation failure following IVF-ET the combined use of low-dose cort icosteroid can be effective for autoantibody-positive women.