Advanced maternal age (AMA) and fertility outcomes – patients’ stories

It’s because of the lifestyle, because of the exposure to metals, smoking, not enough exercise. Men tend to smoke more, drink more alcohol and are also more often exposed to metals and radiation. These are the main factors causing the male sperm not to be as good quality compared to 20-30 years ago.

It hasn’t been studied so far. The studies I was talking about mice. Mice and humans have something in common, so more than in epigenetics.

I meant the quality, not the quantity. Until recently, we thought AMH was stable during the cycle, intercycle meaning in the same month of the patient’s different days, so we thought it was a stable hormone. However, it has been proved that is not.

AMH is linked to the quantity and quality of eggs, so the antioxidants can have an impact on the quality, not quantity. To calculate the ovarian reserve, we need AMH plus the ultrasound. Some years ago, they used to do only the measurement of the AMH, and they thought that it doesn’t give you a prognosis.

I would recommend going to the nutritionist. Most of the time, we have the wrong idea of what it means to eat well. A person who is going to the gym every day and eats salad doesn’t mean that you’re eating healthy because as I said, you need a good proportion of protein, carbohydrates, vegetables, and fat is important. I would suggest going directly to the nutritionist, nutritionist expertise in fertility. The same thing is with sports, it hasn’t been recommended to do sports every day, we also need to rest to build muscle.

It has been linked to having a good impact on fertility. We don’t know the exact mechanism, and we don’t know the threshold. It has been said that more than 3 cups of coffee per day would do damage. Below 3 cups of coffee, that would be beneficial. When I’m talking about caffeine, I’m talking about the bean, and then you have to use the grinder, and then you have to take the coffee instantaneously.

The problem with the coffee is that most of the time we use to take some capsules instead of using beans and a grinder, we do it because we’re always on the run. Those capsules contain metal, so it’s tricky to do things perfectly, but at least we need to be more conscious of what we are doing, and if we can make at least 1 or 2 changes will make a difference.

It has been proved that people who have endometriosis, even though they do egg donation, have more probability of having a miscarriage or complications. Most of the time, it has to do with inflammatory factors, and there is a high probability that endometriosis is linked to adenomyosis, which is endometriosis within the muscle of the uterus.

It’s true that in those women, even if you change the egg, even if you have the best embryo quality if you compare it to a person who doesn’t have endometriosis, who have a healthy uterus, you have more risk of complications. That doesn’t mean you are not going to succeed, it’s not the first time we see people with severe endometriosis, they have egg donation, and they succeed. I know that it’s hard, and after years of trying to find out you had a miscarriage, it’s hard to face the same issue again, but trying again is what I would recommend.

I think that you’re talking about Pfizer because this vaccine is being recently linked to this kind of issue, we are still having a lot of studies, and it hasn’t been proven, but most of the patients are indeed complaining of this kind of problems. Despite this, you go ahead with your reproductive treatment.

Exercise, lifestyle, this is the most important thing. When a patient has more risk of developing high blood pressure, we give them a preventive medication, and when you are pregnant and if you are of more advanced age, we consider it a high-risk pregnancy, and we will monitor it more closely. What you can do are exercise and have a healthy diet.

There are a lot of protocols, and it hasn’t been proved that one is better than the other. Both of them are equal, but we do recommend this kind of natural cycle in women below 40 because those are the women that have more regular cycles, and we won’t expect any kind of irregularity. All three protocols have the same great success.

I wouldn’t be so stuck on the AMH level. As I said, it has to be linked with the ultrasound, this is the most important, the ultrasound and AMH both. I had one patient whose AMH was almost 3 nanograms per millilitre in May, and in December she measured again, and it was 0.8 nanograms per millilitre. We were shocked because she was going to undergo treatment at the beginning of December, 2 weeks later, she had 1.8, so imagine this kind of variation.

An isolated number means nothing unless it’s associated with another test. I wouldn’t like to give you the impression that being so stressed by measuring one thing doesn’t mean anything.

Capsules with coffee, fish, and rice contain a lot of arsenic. Mercury, arsenic and lead are the most frequent metals. You can do a blood test, and you can check the level of the metals. Not everyone, I don’t want to create drama and stress for anyone, but it is good for the patients who are trying to conceive, and they are not able to, but also patients, for example, who have suffered from a headache or amenorrhoea because of this kind of symptoms has been linked with that. You can do a blood test, and depending on the level, your physician can give you medication to get rid of those metals. In some countries like the UAE, where I live, the tap water isn’t drinkable, but sometimes we cook with that water, although we shouldn’t because it contains high levels of metals.

To diminish the amount of Arsenicum that the rice contains, we should wash it with five portions of water. The rice grown in Spain doesn’t contain too much arsenic, I cannot say anything about other countries. I can say that whole grain rice contains more arsenic than white rice.

Your AMH is very low, and with your age, it gives you a few eggs of low quality. I’m not saying that it’s not going to happen, but the probability of being able to get pregnant with your eggs is low. At the age of 40, the probability is to retrieve 10 eggs, the probability of having a healthy baby is 25%. When we are talking about 44-year-old, that percentage drops a lot, and we are talking about 10 eggs. In your case, the only solution I could see if you want to keep on trying with your own eggs is to collect as much as possible and see what will happen. However, I would recommend going for an egg donation.

It could be a residual trigger, or it could be pregnancy. 17 days is too soon, you did it too soon, so what I would do is I would repeat at least in 3-4 days and then see the level, so continue with the progesterone.

Your AMH is good for your age, so yes, I would try at least. I mean, I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to get pregnant and had any kind of cycles. The most important thing to understand is that we are always talking about percentages, this is not a certainty. i

You should also do ICSI, apart from the mobility, I suppose that your partner will have less amount of sperm. He can also take CoQ10, antioxidants, but for the sperm to be able to see an improvement, he needs to take it for at least 3 months. There are a lot of techniques you know that we can do with sperm. Embryologists are the ones who are choosing the sperm so that issue will be solved. They also use MACS, they use different techniques to decide the best sperm. I would give it a try because your AMH is high, so most likely, you will have a high amount of eggs.

I’m not familiar with that therapy of DHEA. I cannot recommend it then.

Most of the time it’s not the therapy itself, but its component. This is something you need to find out. It may not be the treatment. I have never heard of any urticaria because of the implantation, I’m not aware of that.