Objective:

To determine if the live births delivery rate with the eliminating sperm positive to early apoptotic events is higher in couples with unexplained infertility.

Materials and methods:

A pilot randomized controlled trialA pilot and triple-blinded; using a parallel study of two groups. We included a total of 40 couples with unexplained infertility assigned in a 1:1 proportion either to the group A (sperm training method swim-up) or to the group B (swim-up sperm training method supplemented with the use of "magnetic-actived cell sorting (MACS)"). Subsequently, all samples were submitted to intracytoplasmic sperm injection as a fertilization technique. Finally, all embryos obtained were analyzed until the blastocyst stage, and all the transfers were performed in the same stage.

Results:

There are no differences in the fertilization rate; however, with the use of "magnetic-actived cell sorting” there is a higher percentage of good quality embryos on day 3 (90.3% vs 99.5%, p = 0.03) and day 5 (77.3% vs 90.1%, p = <0.0001). In addition, a decrease in the percentage of arrested embryos was demonstrated (16.3% vs 7.9%, p = 0.01). Finally, implantation (42.1% vs 57.1%), clinical pregnancy (60% vs 80%) and live birth rates (55% vs 80%) increased; however, no statistically significant differences were reported.

Conclusions:

The use of "magnetic-actived cell sorting” in couples with unexplained infertility improves embryonic development. Although there is no significant difference, a trend is observed in relation to the increase in the number of clinical pregnancies and live births.