Prime Highlights:
- UAE doctors achieve a medical first by using AI to help a couple conceive despite severe male infertility.
- The breakthrough offers new hope for families in the Middle East, where donor sperm is not an available option.
Key Facts:
- The AI tool, SpermSearchAI, reduced sperm detection time by about 50% and improved the chances of finding more viable sperm.
- The patient’s wife is currently 14 weeks pregnant after the IVF procedure carried out at Dubai’s Fakih IVF.
Key Background:
In a groundbreaking development for reproductive healthcare, doctors in the UAE have successfully achieved pregnancy using an artificial intelligence-assisted sperm detection tool. For the first time in the UAE and the wider Middle East, doctors have used AI technology to successfully tackle a severe case of male infertility.
Specialists at Dubai-based Fakih IVF performed the treatment on a 32-year-old man suffering from Non-Obstructive Azoospermia (NOA), a condition where no sperm is present in a semen sample. Thanks to the cutting-edge system, known as SpermSearchAI, doctors were able to locate rare viable sperm, enabling the couple to proceed with IVF treatment. The man’s wife is now 14 weeks pregnant and doing well.
Developed by the Australian firm NeoGenix Biosciences, the SpermSearchAI system applies AI technology to spot live sperm instantly under the microscope. The technology was introduced to the couple as an option, and they chose to delay surgery until the AI tool became available.
“In patients we have treated so far, the software has reduced the time taken to find sperm by nearly half,” Dr. Ramasamy explained. “Not only does it speed up the process, but it also improves the chances of identifying more viable sperm. Where embryologists might manually find five to ten, AI can detect up to 20 or 30, giving us better options for IVF success.”
The procedure involved MicroTESE (Microsurgical Testicular Sperm Extraction), where small tissue samples from the testes are examined under a microscope. With AI support, embryologists were able to identify rare, live sperm much more effectively.
Experts believe this breakthrough is especially significant in the Middle East, where, unlike in countries such as the US, Europe, or India, donor sperm options are unavailable. Consequently, such technologies as SpermSearchAI become essential to give hope to those couples who would have neither gotten a chance to conceive otherwise.
This achievement not only verifies the potential of AI in promoting medical science but also provides new options to families experiencing the most complicated types of infertility.
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