The minimal stimulation vs. conventional stimulation for
DOR patients
To the best our knowledge, this is the largest study discussing minimal
stimulation, our study included more than 1,000 cycles of conventional
stimulation and 14,000 cycles minimal stimulation IVF in our 16 years of
clinical practices. Our results suggests that in women with similar
ovarian reserve, minimal stimulation IVF showed same success rate as
conventional IVF in terms of oocytes retrieved, available embryos per
cycle, pregnancy rate and live birth rate. Many studies have come to
this same conclusion. Minimal stimulation is more cost-effective
considering less gonadotrophins are used per cycle and if a similar
success can be achieved, it can be considered a good alternative
stimulation protocol for conventional IVF.
Furthermore, the cumulative pregnancy rate show a less steep curve after
two or three cycles, but for the minimal stimulation protocol, the
cumulative pregnancy rate slowly increases after each cycle with the
same speed, which indicates its beneficial to continue the IVF
treatments if possible and fits our hypothesis of waiting for a good
oocyte.