It’s not rare to hear of multiple births when discussing the subject of assisted reproductive techniques; however, it’s quite unusual for IVF triplets to be born 11 years apart from one another! But that’s exactly what happened last month…
This past December, 2010, twin sisters from Britain received a wonderful holiday surprise – another female sibling to round out their family. And best of all, this sibling was particularly special, as she was, in all essence, their biological “twin”, thus turning the girls into triplets.
All three were born using IVF whereby the embryos had been fertilized outside the womb and then medically implanted into the biological mother, Lisa Shepherd.
The Shepherds had originally given birth to their twins 11 years ago, but decided last year they wanted to use the remaining embryos (left from the original IVF treatment) to try to conceive one more time. As it was a success, they now have three girls who are essentially “triplets” of differing ages.
Again, this is an unusual story, but a joyful one. It also shows the viability of embryos that have been frozen for years and then used later for IVF. As reproductive science research advances farther, there’s little doubt that even more amazing “in the news” IVF stories will appear.