Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Ovaries

Is it odd that I have mice with disrupted ovaries? In fact, I think I have two mouse lines that are subfertile. So yes, over time these animals lose the ability to produce eggs. Unfortunately, there aren't problems directly with the eggs. It is more the supporting cells that are disrupted. One probably has a disruption in the theca cells. The other line is less obvious, but possibly also in the theca cells. What I have found is that there is little federal funding for female infertility. Seriously, I would love to investigate these issues, but nobody cares.

Maybe if I were in Germany things would be different. They are worried that their population is actually decreasing. It seems as if people are waiting much longer to settle down and when they do they have few or no kids. This leads me to question whether they might have more concern over female aging and fertility. It seems that they might want to extend the fertile years to permit their population to grow and maybe there would be more federal funding. I haven't investigated this but am curious if this could be the case.

1 comment:

  1. Hi, I have been reading your blog for a while, but never commented.

    We currently live in Germany, and I can tell you that indeed, women here tend to have children later in life. It is not unusual to be 39 with your first toddler in tow. On the other hand, doctors have various attitudes. My gyn is in favour of reaping the benefits of natural fertility and she actually gave me the speech with 35 - advanced maternal age and that yes, modern medicine can help, but more often we hear about the IVF success, not the failures, which are by far more heart wrenching. She should know, she tried and failed. She is 50 and childless and if she doesn't have access to whatever medicine can do in this respect, no one has.
    On the other hand, I have heard of a doctor who told to a pregnant 28yo that she was too young to go have children when her career was non-existent. What can you say, people are people...

    And the German worry that the population is ageing belongs to the past. France and Germany have a positive natality for more than a couple of years. Of course, this trend needs to be sustained, but they are going in the right direction. Both countries support mothers quite extensively, granting benefits and job security and so on to anyone who is willing to give up career to have kids. So surely this is encouraging this positive trend as well.

    But over all, I would say fertility is a major concern for German medicine. There are a lot of clinics, most of them highly rated, they have access to funds, insurance covers fertility treatments.

    These are my 2(euro)cents on the subject.

    Good luck to you. I am keeping my fingers crossed for you to get your heart's desire. ;-)

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