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Women after chemotherapy will have a better chance of getting pregnant
Medical expert of the article
Last reviewed: 01.07.2025
Researchers at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, have found that there is a way to help small eggs mature into healthy ones, increasing the chances of women who have undergone chemotherapy or radiation to successfully undergo in vitro fertilization.
The IVF (in vitro fertilization) procedure has been used in world practice since 1978. It is the leading assisted reproductive technology.
Very often, women who have overcome cancer and undergone radiation or chemotherapy cannot have children because their eggs are destroyed by the radiation.
Despite the fact that science has found ways to preserve eggs and even embryos by freezing, this is only relevant for those girls who have reached puberty. But tumor processes are often diagnosed in very young girls, which reduces their chances of getting pregnant to zero.
Young women may face diseases such as lymphoma, leukemia, neuroblastoma, and sarcoma. After the cancerous tumor is removed, doctors prescribe patients a course of radiation or chemotherapy. This is a necessary measure to prevent the development of metastases in the body and to preserve life, but these procedures lead to sterilization of the female body.
The most reliable way to preserve the ability to have children is to freeze pieces of ovarian tissue containing the embryos of future eggs before undergoing chemotherapy. The so-called primordial follicles - the woman's own genetic material - can be used after several years.
Until now, scientists have been unable to find a way to mature immature eggs outside the body, but they have discovered that a chemical that inhibits the PTEN molecule can stimulate the maturation of small eggs.
"This discovery shows that using PTEN inhibitors is very effective in activating small ovaries in vitro," says Liu Kui, professor in the Department of Chemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Gothenburg. "This could help women whose eggs are not mature enough for IVF."