Fertility is a highly complex process and many different factors need to coincide in order for pregnancy to occur.
A woman must ovulate, have at least one fully functioning fallopian tube, produce watery mucus by the cervix near the time of ovulation that permits the ejaculated sperm to pass into the uterus from the vagina, and have a uterus that permits implantation of the embryo.
A male must produce semen that contains sufficient numbers of healthy motile sperm, and have the ability to achieve erection and ejaculate semen into the vagina.
Infertility can be attributed to either male or female factors, or both. To increase chances of conception a comprehensive range of assisted reproduction services are available such as in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), artificial insemination (AIH, DI), egg sharing, assisted hatching, blastocyst embryo transfer, egg donation, family balancing, frozen embryo replacement (FER), intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), intra-uterine insemination (IUI), ovulation Induction, pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD), surgical sperm retrieval and surrogacy
In this guide
