How can ART help couples with a male infertility factor?
When low sperm counts or poor sperm motility (movement) is the cause of infertility, a procedure called ICSI (Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection – pronounced ICK-SEE) can help. In these situations, the sperm require extra help to fertilize the oocyte (egg). After egg retrieval, the embryologist performs this micromanipulation procedure in the laboratory by capturing an individual sperm and injecting it into the mature egg by means of a small pipette. This process is repeated for each individual egg. For some couples, ICSI has overcome severe male infertility when only a few sperm were available for fertilization.
