EmbryoGen & BlastGen

If you’ve been through miscarriage, had IVF treatment before that hasn’t worked, or if you’re struggling with unexplained fertility or using donated eggs, we might suggest EmbryoGen and BlastGen for your next treatment cycle. 

Could EmbryoGen and BlastGen be right for me?

Using EmbryoGen in IVF treatment does not mean you will have to have any extra tests or go through additional procedures.The only difference with treatment using EmbryoGen is that once we’ve fertilised your eggs and have made embryos, we’ll use EmbryoGen instead of our standard culture medium for around the first three days of embryo development.

What does BlastGen involve?

Just like when using EmbryoGen, choosing to include BlastGen in treatment does not involve additional tests or procedures.

After your embryos have developed for around three days in the EmbryoGen culture medium, we will transfer your embryos to BlastGen culture medium to continue their development to the blastocyst stage.

By ensuring your embryos have the optimum culture medium for their exact stage of development, we can help to maximise the chances of successful implantation following embryo transfer.

What is a Culture Medium?

Culture Mediums (or culture media) are liquids which have been designed to support the growth of cells by containing all the elements those cells need to grow.

EmbryoGen and BlastGen are culture mediums which have been meticulously developed to include those elements which would naturally occur in the womb, including the cytokine Granulocyte-Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor (GM-CSF). GM-CSF is a protein which is produced by cells in the female reproductive tract during the process of embryo development and early pregnancy, and is involved in supporting embryo cell division and viability. With the GM-CSF protein included in our culture mediums, along with lots of other elements which support embryo growth, EmbryoGen and BlastGen can improve the chances of a successful embryo transfer and implantation.

We use EmbryoGen and BlastGen at different stages of your embryos’ development as embryos require different support elements depending on their stage of growth. EmbryoGen is used for the first three days of an embryo’s development, whereas BlastGen is used for the later stages of embryo development, from day three to day five. This change in culture medium mimics how the natural conditions for development inside a woman’s body changes as an embryo grows.