IVF vs ICSI — Which Fertility Treatment Is Right For You?

IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation) places thousands of sperm around each egg in a lab dish and allows natural fertilisation to occur. This works well when sperm quality is normal or near-normal. ICSI (Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection) goes one step further: a single carefully selected sperm is injected directly into each mature egg. This is essential when: - Sperm count is very low (below 5 million/mL) - Sperm motility is severely compromised - Previous IVF cycles had poor or zero fertilisation - Sperm is surgically retrieved (TESA/PESA) - Sperm DNA fragmentation is high At Maatritva IVF in Newtown, Kolkata, Dr. Ankita Mandal recommends ICSI in any situation where fertilisation may be at risk — it adds only a small cost but significantly improves the fertilisation guarantee. For couples with unexplained infertility and normal semen parameters, standard IVF may be recommended first. But if fertilisation is suboptimal after one cycle, ICSI is adopted immediately. The bottom line: IVF and ICSI share the same stimulation, egg retrieval, and transfer steps. The only difference is how the egg is fertilised in the lab. Your embryologist and Dr. Ankita will always recommend the approach most likely to give you a healthy embryo — and explain exactly why.