MILESTONES

Pioneering Role of GDIFR in the success rate of births for IVF patients

Birth by assisted conception has compared in terms of technological sophistication to Man's first landing on the moon!! Our contributions :-

The first IUI- Our contribution to this field of science & technology started with the birth of first baby in India – Intra Uterine Insemination (IUI) in 1983, using a technology indigenously developed by Dr. Sudarsan Ghosh Dastidar. The birth was reported in 1985 at the 5th World Congress Human Reproduction in Greece.

IVF- In 1982 Dr. S. Ghosh Dastidar was a major contributor in independently developing a lab protocol of IVF in Kolkata, leading to the birth of India's 2nd IVF baby in 1986.

ICSI- In 1995, our centre gave birth to India's first test tube baby by ICSI- ZIFT technology, which till today is the most advanced of all ARTs and the last resort in case of severe, unexplained male infertility. This was followed by the birth of the first triplets by ICSI in 1996.

IVF-SURROGACY- In 2005, the Asia's first surrogate baby for a single father was born at our centre.

In 2010 Prof Robert Edwards was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for IVF. The ESHRE published select commemorative comments from leading experts around the world in their special tribute. Dr. Dastidar was the only expert from India who was featured!!

Success Rate at GDIFR

The most important criteria for selecting an IVF centres in India is its success rate. IVF is a very expensive medical procedure and it does not ensure 100% success. For couples IVF means a great deal of psychological stress and financial burden.
 

At GDIFR we have the highest IVF success rates in India.

We have a standard success rate of 55% for ICSI and 50% for IVF below age group 38 years, in certain spell success rates reach upto 60%.

For patients above 38 years success rate varies between 30-40%.

With Donor IVF success rate is about 55-60%.
 

1. Our director is recognised as one of the pioneer of IVF centres in India in the Indian subcontinent with an experience of more than 30 years in the field of ART. The 1st ICSI and IVF Surrogacy in India was done by him. He has had the opportunity to learn from and work with stalwarts such as Prof. Robert Edwards at Bourne Hall Clinic Cambridge. Hence at GDIFR you get treated by the most experienced and respected IVF specialist in the Indian Subcontinent.
2. We have a novel soft stimulation protocol at GDIFR where minimal levels of highly purified gonadotropin combinations are used, hence we minimise the adverse affects of IVF stimulation that have an adverse effect on IVF success rate.
3. At GDIFR every patient undergoes compulsory Psychological counselling by senior psychiatrist to overcome any hidden stress and tension. Recent research shows that stress is a major factor that contributes to lower sperm count, oocytes retrieval and clinical pregnancy.
4. Transfer of embryos is generally done at the Blastocyst Stage which increases implantation rate. This is achieved because of the high standard maintained in our IVF lab.
5. Certain therapeutic interventions are undertaken before embryo transfer aimed at increasing endometrial receptivity.
6. For selected patients with history of repeated IVF failure we follow a novel protocol of cumulus co culture which helps to improve implantation rates.
7. In India the number of embryo transfered per IVF cycle is greater is 4-6, hence the chance of success also increases

Second IVF Program of India

In 1982 Dr. S. Ghosh Dastidar was a major contributor in independently developing a lab protocol of IVF in Kolkata, leading to the birth of India's 2nd IVF baby in 1986.

Dr. Sudarsan Ghosh Dastidar played a pioneer role in the development of IVF technology in India. He was inspired to work in the field of infertility medicine by Dr. Subhas Mukherjee - India’s pioneer IVF scientist- who had started an IVF program in Kolkata which led to the birth of a baby - “Durga” in 1978. However there was a lot of controversy since the program was not perfectly recorded or documented through the stages. Unfortunately the government did not recognize Dr. Mukherjee’s work. He had to suffer humiliation from his community, fellow colleagues and the government which led him to commit suicide. After his death Dr. Sudarsan Ghosh Dastidar & Dr. B N Chakraborty vowed to carry on Dr. Mukherjee’s work. Hence a privately initiated IVF program was started in Kolkata, where Dr. Dastidar developed the laboratory aspect of the program and Dr. Chakraborty developed the clinical aspect.

Back then there was no modern CO2 incubator to incubate human eggs. Dr. Ghosh Dastidar indigenously developed an improvised embryo culture system, which could be used to preserve eggs in culture media. He developed Kolkata’s first IVF laboratory (very primitive) in his study room at 79/28 A J C Bose Road Kolkata-14. He spend hours studying oocyte and cells. Back in 1980’s there were no books on IVF or infertility, no clear photographs of human oocyte or embryo. Hence everything had to be learnt by trial and error. Afterwards a modern IVF laboratory was developed at Dr. Chakraborty’s centre. After many failures Dr. Dastidar achieved fertilization of oocyte and subsequent cleavage to the 6-8 stage in June-July ‘83. Following transfer of this fertilized oocyte a pregnancy occurred (sept-83), unfortunately this ended up in abortion in 10 weeks. It was a major breakthrough as it showed that IVF could be used as a method to treat tubal factor infertility. Dr. Dastidar and Dr. B N Chakraborty jointly presented this data at the 3rd world congress on IVF, Helsinki, Finland May ‘84. This was the 1st report of successful IVF and embryo transfer resulting in human pregnancy in any world congress (May-84).

Dr. Ghosh Dastidar has also been credited with one of the 1st Intra uterine insemination (IUI) pregnancies in the world during 1982-1984. This was reported at the 5th World Congress on Human Reproduction, Athens. At the conference in Helsinki (1984) Dr. Sudarsan Ghosh Dastidar had the opportunity of meeting Nobel Laureate Dr. Robert Edwards, a stalwart in the field of Reproductive medicine. Dr. Edwards was so impressed by Dr. Dastidar’s research that he invited Dr. Dastidar to his clinic at Bourne Hall, England.

Bourne hall clinic proved to be a goldmine for Dr. Dastidar as he got an insight into the basic concepts of IVF research. This knowledge helped him to develop a similar advanced program back home in India. The experience with a global stalwart like Dr. Edwards helped him immensely. From England, Dr. Dastidar travelled to New York where he worked with stalwarts like Prof. Brij B. Saxena and Dr. Mike Bedford at New York hospital. The biggest achievement for Dr. Dastidar was the birth of India’s 1st IVF baby boy Imran on Nov. 1986 (using the same improvised tissue culture system developed by him!!).