electrical activation of post-intracytoplasmic severly amorphous-sperm injection improve fertilization and embryo development

introduction: to evaluate the effect of electroactivation on fertilization and embryo development up to 8-cell stage, after intracytoplasmic injection of severely amorphous sperm. material and methods: oocytes (168) from 13 patients with severe- teratospermia undergoing icsi were divided into control (83) and electro activation (85) groups. in the latter group, oocytes were electrically activated with 1.2 kv/cm for 50 ós using the electrofusion system, model cf-150b (cf-150 biological laboratory service, h-1165 a.u. 31 hungary icf-150) post icsi. results: the results show that there is a significant difference in fertilization rate post icsi between the control (42%) and electroactivation (71%) groups (p=0.04). no significant difference was observed for embryo developmental rates between the two groups during the 66 hr post icsi (p>0.150). however the mean percentage of 8-cells, with respect to total number of injected oocytes, were significantly different between control (15%) and electroactivation group (50%) (p=0.009). conclusion: electroactivation seems to improve fertilization rate and to a certain extent embryo developmental rate 30 minutes post icsi in severe-teratospermic patients.