Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis

Currently, knowing the genetic information of an embryo before being placed inside the mother's womb is possible, thanks to the development of the Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) technique.

Its initial indication was the maternal age, since it is an important factor so that the woman does not get pregnant, or else she becomes pregnant and has an abortion or the saddest thing is that she conceives a pregnancy with a baby with a genetic alteration such as Down syndrome (trisomy 21). After age, new indications have emerged such as:

• serious male factor
• habitual abortion
• fertilization failures
• alterations of the karyotype

The DGP consists that after the ICSI process and under micromanipulation techniques, the embryos on their third day of development are subjected to the extraction of 1 or 2 of their cells and then analyze the nuclei by marking their chromosomes with fluorescent probes or amplifying the DNA of these blastomeres and genetic information is analyzed.
Meanwhile, the rest of the embryo is still in culture to be transferred as soon as the diagnosis is known.