This book explores the social, ethical and legal implications of assisted reproductive technologies (ART). Providing a comparative analysis of several European countries, the authors evaluate the varied approaches to the application of ART throughout Europe. From a global perspective, countries take very different approaches to the regulation of ART. Countries apply restrictions to the access criteria for these treatments and/or direct restrictions to the practice of the techniques themselves. To understand these varied approaches to ART practice and regulation, it is necessary to understand the societal and political background from which they emerged. This book therefore consists of case studies from eight European countries which provide insights into the status and development of the regulation of ART in the last 40 years. The country cases from all over Europe and the three comparative chapters provide insights into the diversity of current ART regulation across the continent as well as into similarities, differences and trends in this regulatory area. This book will be of interest to practitioners of ART who are interested in understanding the differences in regulation of ART in Europe, as well as long-term trends in this respect. Given the ethical and legal implications the book explores, it will also be of interest to students or researchers in the fields of social sciences, humanities and law.

Examines emerging assisted reproductive technologies that will revolutionise the future of human reproduction and their regulation.

This guide provides an overview of quality control in ART laboratories. It explores frameworks and essential tools necessary for effective quality management. The fields of monitoring, equipment maintenance, and the intricate aspects of embryo care and cryopreservation are thoroughly examined. The significance of the ART lab witnessing system is highlighted, demonstrating the seamless integration of both manual and electronic witnessing tools. Readers will gain insights into the roles played by KPIs and SOPs. For aspiring embryologists, this guide offers an exploration of training techniques, addressing the inherent challenges of the field. Practical coping strategies are provided to help navigate these stressors successfully. With real-world case studies and discussions on laboratory design, this resource serves as a guide to achieving excellence in ART. It emphasizes the importance of balancing patient care, procedural accuracy, and practitioner well-being.

Maximise your chance of getting pregnant with this up-to-date and authoritative book that provides a clear and holistic approach to fertility. Areas including: - Understanding your body and maximising your chances of conceiving naturally as well as through complex treatments such as IVF, IUI and egg freezing - A pre-conception plan with sections on lifestyle, nutrition and the role of stress - The common (and uncommon) causes of fertility problems in both men and women - Options for single people and same-sex couples - Up-to-date information on ethics, funding and the law both nationally and internationally - Insightful testimonials from patients dealing with fertility problems and the emotional impact of treatment.Written by Professor Mary Wingfield, one of Ireland's foremost fertility experts who has helped hundreds of people to conceive over the last thirty years. All royalties from the sale of this book will be donated to the Merrion Fertility Foundation, which funds fertility treatment.

Already established as a classic comprehensive reference for the whole team at the IVF clinic, this new edition has been extensively revised, with the addition of several important new contributions on laboratory ( including advanced sperm selection techniques for ICSI, human embryo biopsy procedures, oocyte activation, managing an oocyte bank, artificial gametes, and epigenetics) as well as on clinical topics (including GnRH agonist triggering, segmentation of IVF treatment, uterus transplantation, and risk and safety management). As previously, methods, protocols, and techniques of choice are presented by eminent contributors internationally.

Assisted reproductive technologies (ART) include the artificial or partially artificial methods to achieve pregnancy. These new technologies lead to substantial changes regarding of ethical and legal aspects in reproductive medicine. The book focuses on current hot topics about ethical dilemmas in ART, e.g. about the duties of ethical committees, guidelines regarding informed consent, ethical and legal aspects of sperm donation, embryo donation, ethics of embryonic stem cells, therapeutical cloning, patenting of human genes, commercialization.

This is an increasingly timely book, focusing on issues arising from the impact of COVID-19 on the health care law of the Central and East European countries. It deals with dualism and system of health care law, depicts legal personality in the field of health care, examines property rights and turnover of human tissues, considers moral rights in this field, intellectual ownership in the field of medicine and pharmacy, contracts on health care and contracts on rendering medical services, the legal relationships of transplantology, post-mortem reproduction and donorship, features of family personal property rights in the field of health care, problems of legal regulation of medical workers labour, investigates private legal relationships of surrogate motherhood with foreign element. Special attention is given to the alternative resolution of health care disputes and impact of pandemic on the effective health rights protection. The book is intended for wide auditoria of scholars and practitioners, who engaged in health care rights protection, as well as judges and practicing lawyers, graduate and undergraduate students.

Following the birth of the first “test-tube baby” in 1978, Assisted Reproductive Technologies became available to a small number of people in high-income countries able to afford the cost of private treatment, a period seen as the “First Phase” of ARTs. In the “Second Phase,” these treatments became increasingly available to cosmopolitan global elites. Today, this picture is changing — albeit slowly and unevenly — as ARTs are becoming more widely available. While, for many, accessing infertility treatments remains a dream, these are beginning to be viewed as a standard part of reproductive healthcare and family planning. This volume highlights this “Third Phase” — the opening up of ARTs to new constituencies in terms of ethnicity, geography, education, and class.

Today, it often seems as though Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ARTs) have reached a stage of normalization, at least in some countries and among certain social groups. Apparently some practices – for example in vitro fertilization (IVF) – have become standard worldwide. The contributors to Assisted Reproduction Across Borders argue against normalization as an uncontested overall trend. This volume reflects on the state of the art of ARTs. From feminist perspectives, the contributors focus on contemporary political debates triggered by ARTs. They examine the varying ways in which ARTs are interpreted and practised in different contexts, depending on religious, moral and political approaches. Assisted Reproduction Across Borders embeds feminist analysis of ARTs across a wide variety of countries and cultural contexts, discussing controversial practices such as surrogacy from the perspective of the global South as well as the global North as well as inequalities in terms of access to IVF. This volume will appeal to scholars and students of anthropology, ethnography, philosophy, political science, history, sociology, film studies, media studies, literature, art history, area studies, and interdisciplinary areas such as gender studies, cultural studies, and postcolonial studies.

This book provides the first sustained account of intense debates in China over the ban on single women’s access to assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs). Drawing on the author’s fieldwork in clinics and government agencies in Beijing, it mainly explains Chinese policymakers’ and clinicians’ rationale for restricting single women’s use of ARTs even if they celebrate ARTs as a success of Chinese modernization strategies. The main concept explored in this book is uncertainty. ARTs become a source of discomfort for the Chinese government and clinics because they reveal the uncontrollability of human destiny; they introduce ambiguities into genetic and legal paternity; and they undermine clinical and bureaucratic authority. This book uses ARTs as a lens on broader social changes in China. The uncertainty of ARTs reflects the limits of Chairman Deng Xiaoping’s reform. It also informs that the Chinese government has reversed policies by repackaging tradition and tightening party control. The book’s interpretation of uncertainty challenges the linear and progressive paradigm of modernization. China’s development path is distinct from the sequential logic of Western, modernist conceptions of history.