NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Having artificial insemination to get pregnant? You might want to lie on your back for 15 minutes following the procedure, according to a new study.
In artificial insemination - doctors refer to it as intrauterine insemination, or IUI - sperm is placed directly into the uterus. An earlier study suggested that lying down on your back for 10 minutes after being inseminated could increase pregnancy rates, but there were weaknesses in that small study, the current study's authors note.
The theory is that gravity could keep sperm out of the areas in which conception occurs.
In the current study, which appears online in the journal BMJ, Inge M. Custers, from the Academic Medical Center, Amsterdam, and colleagues randomly assigned 199 women to lie on their backs for 15 minutes after being inseminated and 192 to stand up and move around immediately after the procedure.
More than a quarter - 27 percent - of those who lay on their backs ended up eventually giving birth, while only 17 percent of those who moved around right after being inseminated did.
Having women lie on their backs for 15 minutes may improve pregnancy rates, writes Dr. William L. Ledger, from the University of Sheffield, UK, in an accompanying editorial, but might not be feasible for busy fertility clinics. Such clinics should test the results in their own facilities, he suggests.
SOURCE: BMJ, October 30th Online First issue.
