National Infertility Awareness Week, reproductive health will be here before you know it.  It will be April 20th to the 26th. Infertility in women is far more common than some people think. Infertility is defined as having unprotected sex and not getting pregnant. Upwards of 10%­15% of American women suffer this condition.

At times a patient may wish there was some way to identify the condition before it’s too late. Luckily there’s treatment for this condition. Treatment that will lead to what these women so desperately want. What they want is a baby and it’s not impossible to have one. IVF treatment is a procedure used to help infertile women get pregnant. The IVF process begins with hormone therapy. Women are given hormones to prepare their body for pregnancy. Then several eggs are removed. These eggs will be fertilized in a laboratory. This is where the term test tube baby comes from. This procedure has been done for well over 30 years now.

There are countless people walking on the earth today that have been created using this process. The IVF procedure today is fairly routine. It’s not as uncommon as it was years ago. That’s why these days there aren’t many complications from the procedure. The most common complication is giving birth to more than one child. It’s not all too unheard of for a woman of two or more children. This is because several fertilized eggs are inserted during the procedure.

Several of those could implant themselves and grow to a full term fetus. It should be no surprise that infertility treatments have become so advanced. There are many reasons why women today are infertile. The main reason is that women are waiting longer to have children. This lowers fertility. There are also health conditions that can lead to infertility. A woman can have damaged fallopian tubes. There can be scaring to the tubes. While some women can even have cervical problems. This can cause the sperm to not be able to pass through the cervical canal.

Hormones are something people often joke about. Especially when it comes to woman’s reproductive system. The truth is, they are nothing to joke about. Hormone problems can lead to fibroids and even cause the ovaries to prematurely stop producing eggs. This is known as early menopause. It’s the change of life that happens much earlier and wreaks havoc with a woman’s ability to reproduce.  As you can see infertility is a real problem. If you’re having unprotected sex and not getting pregnant, go to the doctor. Run, don’t walk. There’s a problem. You need to find out what that problem is. Not just for your reproductive health. But, for your overall health. It’s important that you always know that you’re not alone. Women all over the world have problems with fertility. The more you educate yourself about it the more you’ll be able to tackle it head on.