Word: fallopian
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...women, the most common reason for infertility is a blockage or abnormality of the fallopian tubes. These thin, flexible structures, which convey the egg from the ovaries to the uterus, are where fertilization normally occurs. If they are blocked or damaged or frozen in place by scar tissue, the egg will be unable to complete its journey. To examine the tubes, a doctor uses X rays or a telescope-like instrument called a laparoscope, which is inserted directly into the pelvic area through a small, abdominal incision. Delicate microsurgery, and, more recently, laser surgery, sometimes can repair the damage successfully...
Richard and Diana Barger of Virginia could be a textbook case of an infertile couple. Diana's fallopian tubes and left ovary are blocked with scar tissue, ironically the result of an intrauterine device (I.U.D.) she used for three years. Even if an egg did manage to become fertilized, the embryo might be rejected by her uterus, which has been deformed since birth. Richard has his own difficulties: his sperm count is 6.7 million per milliliter, considerably below the number ordinarily required for fertilization under normal conditions. Says Diana: "I never thought getting pregnant would be so difficult...
...experience of cattle and sheep breeders. They have long transferred embryos from prize animals to poorer stock in efforts to upgrade their herds. The human egg in the Australian experiment came from a 29-year-old woman who was trying to conceive. Although her ovaries were healthy, the fallopian tubes connecting the ovaries with the uterus were blocked...
...work by protocol," Harrison explains. As a result, she says, doctors railroad patients into procedures and operations without pausing to consider their wishes. She provides numerous examples of this abuse, adding, "Patients have no choice in what is done to them." In one case, a woman's fallopian tubes are tied (a form of sterilization) after she gives birth because her doctor suspects that her uterus is unfit for another pregnancy. He gets her permission while she is half-paralyzed by anesthesia. Another woman is dragooned into a hysterectomy by a gynecologist who refuses to discuss any other options...
...appendectomy. She woke up in the recovery room with her doctor standing at her beside. While still in an anesthetic haze, she listed as her doctor explained that he had removed her appendix. Then, she cried as she learned that her doctor had also without her consent removed her fallopian tubes because he felt she already had enough children. At the time, she was a twenty-one year old mother of three. Unable to bear the male child she says her husband wanted, Gore divorced a year and a half after the 'operation; she has never remarried...